


Sought you, sang you, dreamed you

by Stars_of_Kyber



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, But some angst in the middle until we reach that, F/M, Fluff, Happy Ending bc I’m a sucker for those, Kid Fic, Slow Burn, We're up for a ride, angsty but it’s okay
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2019-05-19
Packaged: 2019-06-24 12:17:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 37,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15630531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stars_of_Kyber/pseuds/Stars_of_Kyber
Summary: "They looked for her for months, trying to get any clues of her whereabouts, but after some time, they just gave up and decided that the truth was a painful but simple one. Rey didn’t want to be found."15 years after leaving everything behind, Rey returns to Chandrila and tries to live her live without having to face old ghosts of the past.Unfortunately, her daughter Hannah doesn't share her train of thought and is set on finding out whatever it was that her mother left behind on the town 15 years before.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys!  
> This is a very old story of mine that I finaly decided to put into words.  
> Big thanks to my beta Bruna and to Fernanda who doesn't even like Star Wars but reads my shit.  
> Please please tell me what you think of it.  
> Lots of love  
> Cee

Ben Solo knocked and leaned against the old beaten hallway wall of the building where Rey had been living for the past two weeks, since she had turned 18 a week before graduation. She had insisted to rent the little shithole of a place for the month before leaving to college the moment she legally could leave Unkar Plutt’s house and never look back.

Ben had offered her to stay at his house, of course. It was just a month, she had spent much more time in there during the school year anyway. Rey had lived in his bedroom more than she ever lived in Plutt’s small broom closet he called a room, even before they started seeing each other. Also, Ben was half sure his parents loved Rey more than they loved him, anyway. But she had said she needed this. A place of her own, even if just for a month. After all the shitty foster homes she went through, Ben couldn’t blame her for the urge.

Ben and Rey had started dating in the Junior Year of High School, one year after she moved to Chandrilla from Jakku. She initially didn’t like him much, only hanging out with him because of Poe, who normally felt bad for Ben and dragged him along when they hung out. What was initially dislike turned to mutual respect which turned to friendship which turned to… something more. When he realized what was happening, Ben had fallen head first in love with the orphan girl from Jakku.  

After waiting for five minutes with no reply, he knocked again, harder. It was too late for Rey to still be asleep. Since he met Rey, in the beginning of High School, he thinks he never saw her sleep over 9 a.m., no matter the time she went to bed. Also, unlike him, she was a ridiculously light sleeper. How many times had she woken up with Ben’s parents laughter in the kitchen or his mother’s needy yellow cat, Threepio, meowing in the hallway to be let into somewhere or another?

He tried her phone, but it went straight to voicemail, which was no surprise. Rey usually forgot she even had a phone at all. She’d go about her life for three or four days before even realizing her phone was sitting in her backpack, the battery dead.

He tried to ignore the panic rising in his chest as he kept knocking. Rey told him she’d be home packing when they last spoke two nights before. What if something had happened? What if she got hurt or someone broke into her apartment?

Damn, Ben should never have let her live in that horrible place on her own.

After some 30 minutes of knocking and calling her name, he gave up on her door and tried her landlady, an elderly lady who lived in the floor below. When he knocked, the woman half opened the door with a frow.

“What?”

“The...hum.. the girl living on B3?” He asked, voice shaking. “Have you seen her?”

“Look kid, she left yesterday afternoon. That’s all I know.”

“Left?” Ben asked, dumbfounded.

“Are you daft kid?” She snapped. “Yeah, left! Went out with a suitcase, handled me the keys and left.”

“But…” Ben was starting to feel his breathbecome tight in his chest. “Why…? Do you … Do you know where she went?”

“I didn’t ask, she didn’t tell.” She shrugged. “I keep my noses out of the resident’s business.”

“But...” Ben couldn’t breath, he couldn’t think straight, couldn’t formulate an straight sentence.

“Look boy, if she left and didn’t tell no one where she was going, maybe she didn’t want people to _know_ where she was going, yeah?” And she closed the door in his face, leaving him gapping at the poorly painted piece of wood, trying to comprehend what was going on. His heart was hammering against his ribcage and his head was spinning.

With those those breathing techniques his psychologist had taught him in mind, he left the building, trying to think straight. Where would she go? Rey had no one outside of Chandrilla. Why would she go? He knew she’d been nervous about moving to college, facing a new step in her life, meeting new people. He was too. But this wasn’t a reason for her to leave. Had he done something that upset her? Why would she go without telling him? He needed to find her.

His first stop was at Dameron’s house. Rey and Poe were good friends. She might have been staying with Poe.

The young man in question opened the quickly after Ben knocked. He was shirtless, his hair was wet and he looked startled.

“ _Hombre_ , no need to break down the door.” He mumbled, shooting Ben one of his trademark smirks that had most of the girls and some of the boys fawning over him. “ _¿Qué pasa?_ You look nervous.” His smirk turned to a worried frow at the sigh of his worried friend. “Did something happen? Are you having a crisis or something?”

“Have you seen Rey?” He asked, breathing hard.

“Rey? No, not since, like… monday. Why? What’s going on?”

“She left.” Ben mumbled and Poe stared at him like he was half mad.

“Left?” Ben could only nod. Poe kept staring at him for a full minute, probably expecting his best friend's words to magicaly change, before grabbing him by the arm. “Okay man, you sit down, I’m gonna get you you some water and then you’re going to explain this to me, like very slowly.”

Ben was grateful for the couch in the Dameron’s living room, because his head was spinning and he was very close to passing out in the street (apart from the countless times he had crashed there after having a fight with his parents). He leaned at the back at the sofa closing his eyes and breathing in _one, two, three, four,_ and out _one, two, three, four, five, six_ in _one, two, three, four_ …

“ _Hombre_ ” Poe called, shaking his arm. Ben opened his eyes to find his friend offering a glass of water to him with worried eyes. Ben took the water slowly, his hands shaking. “ _Vale_ , drink up, take a deep breath and tell me what happened.”

Ben did. He explained everything between shaky breaths and sips of water. Poe seemed to understand how serious the situation seemed to be because he didn’t open his mouth to interrupt Ben’s story, which was a feature in itself. Poe liked to talk.

“Did you two fight?” He asked, when Ben stopped talking and looked down at the glass in his hands.

“No, things were fine the last time we saw each other. I left her in her apartment and went home.” Ben took a deep breath. “I mean. Rey was kind of quiet. But she’s been like that since she got her acceptance letter from D’Qar. Said she was worried about college.” Ben rubbed his face angrily. “Do you think she’s mad at me?”

“Does she have a reason to be mad at you? Hey dude, look at me.” Poe said, poking Ben in the arm to get his full attention. “Did you do anything to make her mad?”

“No… I mean…” Ben shook his head angrily. “I don’t think so.”

“So she’s probably not mad at you man.” He mumbled. “Now, where would Rey go?”

“I don’t know.” Ben shook his head, defeated.

“Does she know anyone outside of Chandrila?”

“No. I mean she never mentioned anyone.” Ben mumbled sourly. “Only those people in the foster homes she stayed in Jakku, and I doubt she’d go back there.”

“How about that nice old lady who took care of her for a while… What’s her name? Mave?”

“Mauve.” Ben said and Poe nodded. “She died sometime after Rey and I started dating. We went to her funeral and everything.”

“Damn.” Poe rubbed his eyes, his spanish accent -picked up from his parents, since Poe was born and raised on Chandrila - betraying his worry. “Okay, we should check the places Rey might be, in here, before we panic.” Ben got up and followed Poe as he moved to his bedroom and picked up a shirt. “We’ll split.” He looked at Ben from top to bottom as the tall man stood in the doorway. “Are you okay to drive?”

“My car is not here.” Ben looked down at the floor, well he tried to look at the floor, but a layer of Poe’s mess kept him from looking straight at it.

“How did you you get here from Rey’s apartment?” Poe rose his eyebrows at his oldest friend, making his ears burn. “You drove there, right?”

“I walked here.” Ben mumbled

“ _Jesus!_ ”

“I was panicking alright?” Ben rubbed his face with both of his hands.

“Alright, alright.” Poe mumbled, grabbing a set of keys. “I’ll drive you to your car and from there we’ll split, _sí_?” Ben nodded as he followed Poe into his black Ford X-Wing. The car was older then it seemed, but Poe, with his love for cars, spent a good deal of time taking care of it. That was how he and Rey became friends, their mutual love for cars and engines. Poe had gotten his passion from his mother, who cherished and cared for a almost 30-year-old red Ford A, unlike Ben, whose father, as hard as he tried, hadn’t been able to drag into the world of engines and grease. It was said that Han, aunt Shara, uncle Luke, Wedge Antilles and some others would run around, organizing street races over suburban Chandrila and causing all sorts of trouble in their youth. Rey was completely in love after she saw Han’s beloved Volkswagen Falcon, the old piece of junk his father called a car. Ben had no idea how that thing was still running, but Rey seemed to love sitting with his father and talking about it.

Poe’s car was too small to Ben’s ridiculous long legs. At the age of 18 Ben was taller than anyone he knew, apart from uncle Chewie, who was just very ridiculously tall. It all happened very suddenly. Ben had always been tallish, but until his 13th year just that, tall. He finished his 7th grade being just a little shorter than his father, and when he returned from summer vacations to begin his 8th grade, he was a 6 feet lanky teenager, all limbs, and all of his friends and teachers had to look up to talk to him. It was also around this time Ben had started to let his hair grow longer. People always said he would grow into his big ears, but alas, he had become almost a giant and his ears were still ridiculously big.

“So, where should we start looking?” Ben asked, tapping his fingers nervously against the dashboard.

“I was thinking maybe I check with people from school and you could check with your parents and at the garage.”

“I can’t think of a single reason Rey would go back to Plutt’s Garage.” Ben mumbled, looking out at the window.

“I can’t think of a single reason for Rey to leave at all.” Poe answered, trying to sound kind, for he could see the desperation still painted in his best friend’s pale features. “So we check everywhere, right?”

“Right.” Ben mumbled, leaning his head against the window and closing his eyes. He didn’t want to imagine the rest of his life without Rey. He didn’t want to imagine surviving college without her. Or watching bad sitcoms without her. He only watched sitcoms because of her! Okay, he did enjoy them more than he thought he would, but it was all because of her.

Maybe she had finally realized what a shitty person he was. That he was a problematic piece of shit with a load of emotional baggage and family issues to last for a lifetime, that he would probably spend the rest of his life going to a psychologist and needing medicine to go through the day. Maybe she realized that she could do much better. Maybe…

“Ben? Bro?!” Ben snapped out of his mind as Poe poked his arms. “You alright there?”

“Yeah.” Ben sighed, rubbing his eyes. “Just thinking.”

“Thinking is never a good idea.” Poe tasked. “Are you sure you’re good to drive?”

“I’ll be fine.”

“Right, so I’m gonna stop by Jess and then Snaps. See if they know anything about it.” Poe mumbled as Ben opened the door.

“I’m gonna check with my parents.” He said. “Keep your phone with you and call in case you find anything.”

“Will do.” Poe mumbled, closing the door. Before Ben walk to his car, Poe lowered his window and leaned against the passenger seat. “Try to be chill yeah _hombre_? If you start to get overwhelmed stop and breath and call me. Don’t go out punching things, that never works.”

“I’ll try.” Poe seemed to be satisfied with the answer and waited until Ben started his car to leave in the direction of Jessyca Pava’s house.

After it happened, Ben barely remembered anything of the drive from Rey’s street to his house. It was like he was underwater and he was just thankful he hadn’t crashed his car on the way.

His father was in the garage, elbows deep in the Falcon when Ben arrived. Han Solo had a youthful face, despite the gray peppered in his hair and wrinkles in the corner of his eyes. His mother said it was because he always had that stupid smirk on his face. Ben blamed also the frow of his brows whenever he was mad or disappointed. It seemed to run in the family.

“Hey kid.” He mumbled, looking up from the engines when Ben took too long to answer. “Jesus son, you look like crap.”

“Thanks dad.” Ben said, rolling his eyes.

“Everything alright?” Han asked, cleaning his hands in a dirty rag and leaning against the chassis of the car.

“Have you seen Rey?”

“Rey?” Han frowned. “I thought you when to pick her up. You had a fight or something?” His frow only got bigger when Ben’s shoulders slumped, defeated.

“Her landlady said she left.” Ben admitted.

“Left?” Han finally abandoned the car to fully look at his son. “What do you mean left? Why would Rey leave?”

“The lady said she gave back her back the keys and left with a suitcase.” Ben mumbled, sitting down on a stool.

“Ben…” Han said, carefully approaching his son like he was a caged animal and it annoyed him more than appeased. “Ben, did something happen? Did you do something?”

“No!” Ben yelled, picking up the first thing in his reach, which was a wrench which was sitting in a metal table, and throwing it across the room, making his father flinch. “I mean…” His anger deflated and he slumped against the stool again, feeling empty. “Not that I can tell. Things were fine!”

“Okay, okay!” Han said, throwing his hands up. “Do you have any idea why would she leave?” He asked and Ben shook his head. “Where she went?”

“I don’t know.” Ben cried, frustrated. “We’re looking for her. Poe went to check with Jess and Snaps and I came to see if you and mom might have spoken to her.” Ben lifted his eyes to his father when he felt an uncarateriticly sympathetic hand fall to his shoulder.

“Your mom is upstairs.” His father said softly. “I’m gonna call Chewie and see if he knows anything. Just…” Han mumbled, squeezing Ben’s shoulder. “Just take it easy, alright? Don’t... freak out or anything yet, ok?” When he saw Ben agree with a nod of his head, he sighed. “Okay, good.”

 The rest of the day was spent in search for where Rey might have gone. His mother seemed as surprised as everyone else when he told her what the old woman had told him. Poe also didn’t have any luck with their friends and they even talked to Plutt, who said he hadn’t spoken with Rey since she left his house and told them to tell her she not to show up close to him anytime soon.

The two weeks before college started passed in a blur of looking for Rey (The police started to help, but after they talked to the landlady and found out that she had taken all her savings from her bank account, they seemed to reach a conclusion that she wasn’t missing and therefore there was nothing they could do) and packing all stuff he would need to take to D’Qar and in the last week of August he found himself carrying three boxes up his new dormroom in an old brown brick building five hours away from his home.

All search for Rey had ended up in dead ends. Her phone line was cancelled and so was her bank account. The only things left in her apartment were some clothes and high school material she was not going to need anymore. She was simply gone.

Their last hope was for her to show up in college. She was supposed to start classes just as they did, and maybe there was a slim possibility that she would just show up to D’Qar like nothing had happened. Maybe she had just freaked out about the idea of college. Maybe she just needed some time for herself. It wasn’t unusual. Rey had her solitude needs from time to time and the idea of college had been taking the toll on her lately.

Hanging on to that small hope, he made his way to the department of Mechanical Engineering. A small woman with graying hair greeted him in the reception desk.

“Good morning dear.” She said with a cheerful smile. “Are you a freshman?”

“Good morning.” He mumbled, gripping down the nervousness in the pit of his stomach. “No, actually, I have a friend that is, I wanted to get some information for her…”

“Of course dear. What’s her name?”

“Hum.. Rey Jones.”

“Just a moment.” The woman said, looking at the square box screen of her computer. “Well dear, it says here her application was cancelled just last week.”

“Cancelled?” Ben’s voice sounded strangled.

“Yes. Very strange.” The woman said, looking from her computer screen to him. “Tell your friend to come by here, we’ll have to fix that if she wants to start her classes on monday.”

“Yeah… Okay. I’ll tell her to come by.” He said, trying to smile, but probably failing. “Thank you, ma’am.”

“Sure thing dear.” He said, patting his hand sympathetically. “Have a good day.”

“You too.” He thought he mumbled, but he couldn’t be sure.

He made his way to his new dorm in a haze of sorrow and white blinding rage and, as soon as the door was closed behind him, he threw his fist at the wall, feeling his knuckles split with the force of the punch. He did it again and again until he felt his fist crossing the wall, opening a hole in it. After that he threw the table in the foot of his bed across the room, making it land upside down between the beds, his box of clothes following suit. After his rage had subsided, he sat on the bed, running his hands through his hair, not caring about the bloody finger or the throbbing pain in his right hand and cried, ugly sobs scaping his mouth.

It took about thirty minutes for him to be able to calm the fuck down and he after that, he just felt numb. He set in the bed, staring at the wall ahead of him just feeling like he had a huge hole in his chest.

He wasn’t sure how long had passed until he heard the door clicking open, and he barely had the strength to look at it.

“Well, it looks like you already made yourself quite at home.” Standing at the doorway holding a suitcase was a pale skinny boy with very red hair carefully pulled back. He had a look of disgust in his face that Ben wasn’t sure if it was about him, about the mess the room was in or if it was just his normal face. “Next time try to keep the mess in your side of the room, yes?” He said, trying to get around from the mess in the floor to his bed. “Whoa you look like you’re having a very crappy day hum.” He said, when he looked at Ben’s face.

“Who are you?” Ben finally snapped out of his surprise. The young red haired boy rolled his eyes at the tall man sitting in the bed across from him.

“I’m your roommate.” He said, like it was the most obvious thing, which probably was, but Ben’s hazy mind was too tired to pick it up. “I’m Armitage Hux, but please call me Hux.”

“I’m Ben. Ben Solo.”


	2. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 15 years later, Rey's moving back to Chandrila, and her daughter Hannah makes some interesting discoveries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look at me, updating in the day I promissed to, I'm so proud XD  
> This chapter is a little introduction to Hannah and we'll start disclosing what happened to Rey starting next chapter.   
> This chapter is a little smaller then the rest of them so far.  
> Big thanks to my lovely beta Bruna for putting up with me and my twenty messages of "Have you read my shit yet?"  
> Enjoy

Hannah Thompson dropped yet another one of the brown card boxes she’d been helping fill and carry for the past month to the floor with a distraught grunt. Her mother and her spent the better part of the hot humid summer morning bringing boxes and pieces of furniture into their new home, only stopping to eat the take-outs they had ordered before starting with the work back again. Sweat was dripping from her forehead and her back was killing her and it wasn’t even the middle of the afternoon yet. She didn’t know how her mother was still standing. 

“Is it over yet?” She asked, sitting down on the box she had just brought in. 

“You wish.” Her mother replied with a smirk, carefully placing the box she was carrying down. “And don’t sit on the boxes. You don’t know what’s in that.” 

“Mom, I can read.” Hanna said, pulling her legs up to show the words her mother herself had written when they were packing their tiny apartment on Takodana. The older woman just rolled her eyes at her. “It says books.”

“Well, don’t sit on my books.” She waved her hand at her daughter. “They weren’t made for sitting. There’s still a lot to carry, come on.”

“Ma’, my back hurts.” She whined, like she used to do when she was a little girl and wanted her mother to pick her up. Now at the age of 15, being as tall as her mother, she didn’t think it was going to work. 

“You think mine doesn’t?” The older woman said, kissing her cheek softly and pushing some of the dark mop of hair away from Hannah’s eyes. “After we’re done with the day we can order some pizza and watch some TV show, how ‘bout that?” Her daughter didn’t look convinced. “We can order extra cheese and cream cheese crust.” 

“Alright, okay.” Hannah mumbled with a resigned sigh. 

“That’s my girl. I know you can’t resist pizza.” Rey smiled. “Those two boxes go up to your room.” Hannah let out another grunt. “Don’t gimme that attitude. It’s your stuff.”

“If it’s mine, can I just throw it all away?” She asked with a smirk. 

“Suit yourself.” Her mother shrugged, turning away to head outside and gather more boxes. “Just remember I won’t be buying anything you threw away again.” 

Hannah just watched as her mother made her way out of the room. Rey Thompson was tall and graceful, with long limbs, warm tanned skin and brown hair framing a pair was warm hazel eyes and freckles, which she had inherited. It was the only thing Hannah knew for sure she had inherited from her mother, along with her small nose. With a mop of unruly coal black hair, ghost pale skin, awkward lanky limbs and ears that were way too big for her face, Hannah looked like her father. Actually, it was the only thing Hannah knew about her father at all. 

_ ‘You look like him’ _ , Rey had mumbled with a sad smile one day when Hannah was eight and was particularly set on pestering her about the ever looming mysterious presence in her life that was her father.  They had numerous heated arguments about the subject over the years, Hannah’s strong temper flaring and the young girl screaming accusation after accusation over her mother, but the only thing Rey would only sigh and mumble  _ “you look like him” _ . It drove Hannah insane. 

She knew her mother was young, having had her at the age of 18, but apart from that, her mother’s past was another well kept secret. She knew that she had spent part of her teen years in Chandrila, but hadn’t been born in there, that there was no one else in the family but the two of them (by her mother’s choice or not she couldn’t tell), and that Rey got ridiculous upset when the subject was brought up. So Hannah usually avoided it. When she wasn’t angry. She didn’t think very straight when she was.

With her back crying out in pain, she picked up the first box and started to slowly make her way to what would become her bedroom. 

When Hannah was small, they lived in a shoebox flat that aunt Maz rented to her mother for a cheaper price. They lived there for years, Hannah sleeping with Rey on the bed tucked in a corned in the room. It was where they lived while Rey took night classes and worked two jobs to be able to take care of her. It was where they lived when Rey finally graduated. When she managed to get her first real job as a mechanical engineer, they were able to move to a two bedroom apartment. It was still tiny, but they had their own rooms. Hannah was eleven. Now, her mother had gotten a good paying job that would allow her to take her Masters as she worked and wouldn’t force her to drive almost two hours to and from work , and that forced them to move to Chandrila as fast as they could, leaving everything that was remotely a part of Hannah’s childhood behind.

It was not that Hannah was bitter about her mother getting good things in life. She had been to one to reassure Rey over and over again that “yes, you should take the job”, “yes, we should move to Chandrila”, “yes it’s a chance of a better life for us” and “no mom, I won’t be mad at you if we go”, but it was hard to leave everything, everyone she knew behind to start all over again in somewhere totally new. But her mother deserved good things. So Hannah would play nice.

Truth be told, Hannah felt somewhat guilty for the fact that only now her mother was starting to be able to have good things for herself. Rey had, over the years, sacrificed much of her life so Hannah could have a decent one. That meant working two jobs so they could have a way to maintain them both. It meant postponing her dream of going to college for at least four years and taking night classes in some state college because they couldn’t afford her to go to a good one. It meant missing finals or much needed hours of sleep or study because Hannah was sick and there was no one else to watch her (and Hannah had been sick a lot when she was little). It meant not buying a book she needed to college because Hannah needed new clothes or school material. Her mother had always made very clear that Hannah was her top priority, above everything else. Never once she heard Rey complain about it, but she knew, from her mother’s sad and lost gaze, or the way she cried softly when she thought Hannah was sleeping, that somewhere deep inside she resented it a little. All she had to give up. She could be a Doctor in Mechanical Engineer now at the age of 33, having attended to some major college like Horsian Prime or D’Qar, not some random little college on Takodana. Her mother was beautiful and brilliant. 

She could have been so much more.  

Hannah dropped the box in the space that would be her room. Her mattress had been placed against a wall and a couple of her boxes were already in there. Dropping the one she was holding, she stretched before going back down to the living room. When she reached the end of the stair, she came face to face with two boxes.

“Mom!” She yelled “The boxes are multiplying!” Her mother’s head poked out from the kitchen, frowning at her. “There were two boxes here. I took one upstairs. There are still two boxes here. How are there still two boxes here?” Rey only rolled her eyes.

“The one on the top has to go to the attic.” She said, ignoring her dramatic attitude.

“We have an attic now?” Hannah asked, raising an eyebrow. “Why do we need an attic?” 

“It was in the lease. It’s where the ghosts of the house live.” She said, planting a kiss on her head. “Unfortunately we didn’t find a way to evict them, so we’ll have to share.” 

“I’m not afraid of ghosts since I was like six.” Hannah said, rolling her eyes at her mother’s smirk. 

“Good, so you’ll have no problem sharing with them.”

“I hope they can play chess.” Hannah mumbled, picking up the box. “I need someone decent to play with me. I’m getting tired of beating you.” 

“I can play chess just fine!” Her mother scoffed, earning her a laugh. 

“You keep telling yourself that!” Hannah said behind her shoulders as she went up the stairs, leaving her mother in the landing with her hands on her hips, outraged.

The attic was exactly what Hannah had imagined. An empty room with wooden floors and some spider webs hanging from the sealing. It was actually a little useless space for her and Rey. They didn’t have so much stuff to have an extra room just to keep it.

“Hey ghosts.” She mumbled quietly. “I hope we can all be friends and stuff.” 

Turning on the lamp with one hand while trying to balance the heavy box with the other, she went in the dusty room. There was only one other box in there, labeled  _ “Hannah’s Baby Stuff _ ” sitting in a corner next to the wall. Hannah settled the box on the floor, taking a peek at the other one. Apparently her mother had already opened it earlier. She could see the pink blanket she was taken home wrapped in and the top of Mr. Log’s head, her stuffed alligator she carried everywhere when she was a little girl with dark piggytails hanging from the back of her head. Life was good, even if complicated at times, when Hannah was little. She missed it.

She made her way to the stairs before catching a glimpse of the other box she had brought up. 

In big familiar handwriting, it said  _ High School Stuff _ .

Hannah was about to start High School so it didn’t make sense that she had a box of  _ High School Stuff  _ stuffed in the attic. So it must mean...

Oh…  _ Oh _ !

Forgetting about her burning back and sweaty forehead, she ran back to where she placed the box, sitting next to it and ripping the tape that kept it shut with her bare hands. Did her mother really had a box of things from her High School years? How did Hannah never see it? 

What if her mother never wanted her to see it?

The last though made her stop, hands frozen in the carton lid. Maybe there was a reason for her mother never showing her that. Should she snuff through her mother’s things without her permission? Would she be mad at her? She would never let the box laying around if she didn’t want Hannah to see it, right? Just a little peek wouldn’t kill her though, would it? 

Her curiosity got the best of her and, checking behind her to see if Rey wasn’t there, she opened the box. 

There were four thick red yearbooks, a 1 st place trophy of the State Robotics competition of 2001, a silver medal for a volleyball team and and a an embroidered blue jacket from the Robotics club with the name Jones behind it. 

She picked up the jacket first. The name behind it intrigued her. It was a fit model, clearly female, and had some stains of grease in the sleeves. Maybe it was a spare? Or belonged to one of her mother’s friends? Who was Jones?

Setting the jacket aside, she ignored the trophies and went straight for the yearbooks. The four of them were worn, like someone went through it time and again, but the dust coating it showed that had been a while since anyone touched them. That box seemed to be packed for years, probably since they moved from their flat. Pulling them to her lap, she checked the covers. The New Republic High School Yearbooks covers had the coat of arms of the school in the front, along with the year, and the Mascot of the School in the back, some strange bird with big eyes. 1999, 2000, 2001 and the last one from 2002…. 

Was it possible that her mother and her father met as school? Was he on that yearbook she was holding right now? 

Her heart was hammering against her chest as she pushed some of her hair from her face and opened the first page. The first thing she noticed in the page was her mother’s messy handwriting crossing the sheet in big bold letters saying “FINALLY FREE!” and a heart around the year of 2002. Someone also had drawn a robot in it. 

“Hannah?” Her heart nearly stopped when she heard her mother calling from the bottom of the stairs. She rushed to push everything back into the box, but Rey didn’t seem to be getting up the stairs. “The ghosts got you?”  

“No!” She yelled back from the door, trying to control her voice so her mother wouldn’t notice the quiver on it. “I was just opening the boxes to check if they were really meant from the attic and I found Mr. Log and some baby pictures.”  

“Oh yeah!” Her mother’s voice sounded cheerful. Rey loved to go through her baby pictures. “I put a box with your baby things in there this morning. Now, come on!” She called. “There’s a surprise for you down here!”

“I’ll be just down!” She answered, before rushing to her baby stuff and grabbing Mr. Log. She was just about to leave when her eyes set again on the yearbook box. Before she could hold herself or lose her nerve, she grabbed the 2002 yearbook and dashed out of the room, shutting the door behind her. 

Checking to see if her mother was around, she made her way to her new bedroom as fast as she could without looking suspicious. She could hear her mother’s happy voice echoing from downstairs. 

Closing the bedroom door behind her as quietly as she could, she placed Mr. Log on top of a box and looked around for a place she could hide the yearbook. Her mother might check her boxes later, to help her put things away or to look for something of hers. The mattress would be moved if not today, tomorrow. 

Settling for the closet, she found a stashed away drawer in the very bottom of it, shoving the red leather book in there and running out of the room. 

She took several deep breaths before she reached the stairs, willing herself to calm the fuck down. If her mother noticed she was nervous, it would be the end of her yearbook discoveries and possibly the beginning of a very big mess she would have put herself into. 

She went down the stairs slowly, checking for whatever surprise her mother had mentioned. 

“Well if it isn’t my little, not so little, pixie!” She turned around to face the owner of her voice. A man with warm brown skin and dark hair was staring at her with a smirk plastered on his face and a leather jacket hanging from his arms. A man she recognized.

“Uncle Poe!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, whatcha think? Please please let me know.   
> Next chapter we're going to have a big participation of our rogue handsome pilot, so be ready.   
> I'll be updating the fic every friday and I already have the next three chapters ready yey.   
> The name of the fic is from the song "Dulcineia", from The Man of La Mancha, I forgot to say that in chapter one. Kudos and comments warm my heart.   
> Lots of love   
> -Cee


	3. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How Poe Dameron met Hannah and found Rey again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LOOK AT ME POSTING THINGS ON TIME!   
> I'm going to start posting on Thursday nights because it's going to be easier for me to.   
> Now we're going to start exploring hat happened to Rey after she left and a bit of her motivations.  
> I hope you enjoy this chapter that I wrote with much love.   
> Love to my beta, Bruna, for putting up with me because I'm not easy.   
> Love you guys <3

The first time Poe Dameron met Hannah had also been the first time he saw Rey Jones after she disappeared from Chandrila without a trace. They looked for her for months, trying to get any clues of her whereabouts, but after some time, they just gave up and decided that the truth was a painful but simple one. Rey didn’t _ want _ to be found. 

Meeting her five years later in some shaddy dinner in a small town close to where his car had broken down had been just a huge coincidence. If Poe was a man who believed in meant-to-be and such (which he wasn’t much), he’d say it was destiny. 

He’d been driving for hours, coming back to college after a visit to his parents in the Thanksgiving Holiday (which his parents, being Cuban and Guatemalan, did not celebrate, but it was a reason to visit nonetheless) when his car sputtered and died, leaving him stranded in an empty road in the middle of fucking nowhere. 

He had to walk for almost an hour to find the little town of Takodana hidden among the trees, where he was hoping he would find the toothed belt he needed to get his car to work again and hopefully get to college before dawn so he could spend his last free day lazing off in his bed. Just life wouldn’t be so kind to him.

“The mechanic only comes by tomorrow.” The owner of the shop he was trying to get the parts said, barely sparing a glance his way. “I can tow your car in, but only get it checked in the morning.”

And that was how Poe ended up at the front steps of Maz’s Palace, the biggest place in town, where it was said the owner, Maz, could get you a room to stay the night, in the middle of a cold but sunny afternoon, squirming at the place. The inside was light, yet ridiculous shady and all type of people milled around. A group of three men stood by the bar drinking, even though it was still three o’clock and they seemed like they had started it long before. Some ordinary people set on spaced out tables and booths, enjoying late lunches or early dinners, and a lady, who also seemed to be stopping-by, held her purse so tight against her lap that seemed like it was hurting her. 

Poe set on a dark booth in a corner, pulling a menu up to his face. His stomach growled, making sure he was aware that it was time to be fed.  After a few minutes, the waitress stopped next to his table.

“Good afternoon, are you ready to…” Poe dropped his menu in shock, staring to make sure the sweet bubbly british accent he was hearing in fact belonged to the face he was imagining or if the hunger and the long walk under the sun were just making him go insane. “Poe?!”

And there she was, standing right in front of him, her hazel eyes staring at him in surprise and shock, her lips hanging open in a silent “oh”, her brown hair trapped in the old usual and practical neat three buns style he always seen her use during High School.

“Rey…?” 

He gaped at her, in complete loss of words. “You? What are you…? How?” 

“I work here.” She mumbled, running her hand over her apron, a little tag with her name in cursive letters pinned to the left side of her chest. “How the hell did you end up here?” 

“Car problems and… Actually, do you have a moment?” 

She looked back nervously at the bar, biting her lower lip, and he wondered if she’d tell him no before she waved at the small woman who was sitting in there.

“Hey Maz, can I take five?” She asked. The tiny person didn’t even look up as she signaled back in affirmative. Rey looked at the back door before sitting up across the booth from him. 

“ _ Jesús _ , woman, when my car broke I never in my wildest dreams I imagined that I would find Rey Jones here.”

“It’s Thompson now.” She mumbled, not meeting his eyes. 

“You got married or something?” He asked surprised, raising his eyebrows at her. 

“No, no… God no!” She laughed nervously, fidgeting with her hands. “I just changed after…” 

“After you completely vanished without a trace?” Poe felt the bitter satisfaction when Rey flinched at his harsh tone. “I guess you really didn’t want to be found did you?” 

“It’s…” She bit her lips again. “It’s complicated Poe, really...”

“Yeah I can see that.” He mumbled, staring down at her face. Rey hadn’t changed much in the past five years. She still had her freckles across her nose and that youthful smile she greeted him before she realized it was him, but she looked… tired. Worn off. Big dark bags hung under her eyes and he could notice her hair wasn’t as tiddly put up as it used to be. “Since you’re waitressing here in nowhere, corner with neverland and a town over no place city.”

“Look Poe…I...” She started, her eyes wandering off to the back door again. “How did you even end up here?” 

He scoffed at her abrupt change of subject. 

“My car broke down in the middle of nowhere lane when I was coming back from visiting my parents.” He mumbled. “Apparently there is only one mechanic in this whole place that might get me the part I need to fix my car.” 

“That’s me.” She mumbled, looking at his face for the first time since she set down. “I’m the mechanic, I mean.” 

“So not just waitressing but fixing cars as well.” He tasked at her and she rolled her eyes. “Did someone threaten to hurt you or anything?” He asked and she rose her eyebrows at him. “You owned anyone money? That’s why you left?”  

“No Poe, that’s not…” Before she could finish there was a noise of the back door swinging open and Rey turned to look at it, her face turning three shades pailer as she did. Poe turned to look at what she was looking at it was at time slowed down. 

There was a child. A little girl, maybe four or five years old, was skipping her way through the bar and over where they were sitting. The shock wasn’t seeing a child in that environment, though it was a little surprised. He was struck by how much that girl reminded him of Ben, his oldest friend, when he was a child. All long gangly limbs and black hair, she was tall for a child, with a long face, big ears and very pale skin. It felt like he was staring down at a memory of his early years or a picture of their first day of class. Before he could fully take the girl in, she stopped next to where they were sitting. 

“Ma’.” She mumbled, pushing her arms up to be picked up. Poe looked at Rey, waiting for the moment where she would deny it, or laugh at the little girl, to tell him it was a joke of sorts, but she did no such thing. She didn’t look at him as she picked the girl up and set her in her lap, pushing a loose lock of black hair behind the girl’s ear lovingly. The kid was opening her mouth to say something when she noticed him sitting there. She immediately shut her mouth, looking at Rey confused. 

“Hanny, that’s mum’s friend, Poe.” She mumbled, not meeting Poe’s eyes. “Poe, that’s my daughter, Hannah.” 

“Hi.” Hannah said, the tip of her ears turning red just like Ben’s would when he was embarrassed or nervous. 

“Hey..” It was all he could muster. She examined him, looking over his face, before turning back to Rey. 

“Can I go get some ice cream?” She asked, blinking up her long eyelashes at her mother. 

“Alone?” Rey replied, staring at the girl. 

“Aunt Maz said she’d come to the store with me.” She said. “Please, we’ll just take a minute.” Rey looked at her, then at the tiny woman who was standing in the door. She woman gave her a thumbs up and Rey sighed. 

“Alright.” She said. “But don’t get out of Aunt Maz’s sight, yeah?” 

“Thank you mama!” The girl kissed Rey’s face before practically jumping out of her lap and running to the older woman who was waiting for her by the door. “Bye mister!” She yelled and Poe barely had the time to lift his wand in a confused wave before the door was shut and the girl was gone. 

Poe was confused. This whole scene didn’t seem possible. Maybe he was dreaming. Maybe he had reached home and fell to bed, so exhausted that he was having crazy dreams. Maybe his car had crashed and he hit his head and now he was in a coma, making up wild alternative realities in his drugged up mind. But this was way to crazy for him to come up with something like it. He rubbed his eyes, trying to think straight and when he opened them, Rey was staring at him expectantly.

“Is she…” he trailed off, but Rey seemed to know what he was talking about because she just nodded. “Fuck.” He mumbled, tugging on his hair. “She looks like him.” It was all he could come up to say. 

“She does.” Rey said, looking at the door with a sad smile. 

“That’s why you left. You were pregnant.” She nodded again. “Were you out of your fucking mind?” He snapped and she stared wide eyed at him. “ _ Dios _ . Why would you do something like that Rey? We looked for you everywhere. Everyone was worried sick. We thought you might be dead in some ditch or only God knows where. I thought Ben was finally gonna freak for good. You should have seen it…” 

“You can’t tell him.” She asked, her voice desperate, just above a whisper. 

“Tell him that he has a, what, four-year-old daughter?” She just stared at him with pleading eyes. “Rey that girl is 50% of him.” Poe said, banging his hand on the table, making her jump. “ _ Mierda _ , look at her, she’s like 80% of him. Don’t you think he had the right to know?” 

“You can’t just come here out of nowhere and tell me how you think I should live my life when you have no idea what it’s like, Poe Dameron.” She said in a shouted whisper, pointing her finger at him, her face turning red. “You can’t just tell me what to do.” 

“She’s his daughter!” He argued.

“She’s  _ my _ daughter!” She finally snapped, punching the table and making several faces turn to stare at her. She rubbed her face before looking back at him. “Mine and no one else’s.” 

“You didn’t give anyone a chance…” 

“I didn’t give anyone a chance to abandon her before she was even born!” She hissed. “I didn’t give them a chance to abandon  _ me _ like  _ everyone _ else did in my life.” 

“ _ Oh _ .”

“Oh alright.” She hissed, her eyes glimmering with unshed tears. “I left before they could leave me.” The entire cantina felt ridiculously silent after the words left her mouth and they didn’t speak for a few minutes. 

“And do you regret it?” Poe asked in a low voice. “Leaving?”

“What’s done is done.” She shrugged defeated, her anger deflating every passing moment. “I can’t change the decisions I made now. Only make better ones ahead.”

“Maybe you could still…” He tried, but her eyes hardened again.

“No.” She said, shaking her head firmly. “Just, Poe, please… Just no.” She sighed. “Just please don’t tell Ben.” 

“Look Rey…” He started, running his hand through his hair. “I won’t tell him, okay?” She relaxed at his words, leaning against the back of the booth. “I really think you should and all, but...” he sighed. “even if I wanted to, I haven’t spoken to Ben in two years.”

“You… What?” Rey looked like someone had just slapped her. “How… why? You’re his best friend! What happened Poe?!”

He sighed, trying to think of the best way to tell her the simple true. Ben was turning out to be a dick. 

“We… we had this fall out.” He mumbled, looking down.

“You and Ben had fallouts all the time Poe Dameron, what happened?”  

“He started hanging out with these idiots from Law School.” Poe sneared. “His pompous red haired idiot of a roommate, Hux and that Phasma chick.” He rubbed his face with his hands. “Then he started an internship under this old creepy guy, a british dude named James Snoke.” Poe shook his head. “I don’t know Rey, I think they managed to get into his head or something. One summer we came back home for the holidays and he was angry, very mad at, like, everything. Halfway through it, he had this big fight with Han and Leia.” Rey gasped. “Like it was really huge, shattered stuff everywhere and the neighbours almost called the police and shit. He packed and said he’d never look at them again. I tried… I tried to talk some sense into his head but you know how Ben is.” Poe’s voice sound defeated with the memory of it. “We fought. It wasn’t like the normal fights we used to have. It was nasty. We both lost our tempers big time. We said…” He choked. “I said some things I didn’t mean, some shit that I just said because I was angry. It was ugly Rey.”

Poe didn’t like to think about that day. He had tried to talk to Ben, to make him see reason. He should have stopped when he saw Ben, the way he was acting. But he felt, like a good friend, he should be the one to make his friend see reason. The truth was, Ben hadn’t been the same since Rey left. She was always the best one to knock some sense into his head, by force if necessary. And Poe wasn’t as cool headed as he liked to pretend he was.  He tried to keep calm, but Ben wouldn’t listen. He was just so wrapped up in his friends’ manipulation he was just blinded by it, taking shit about letting the past go. And then he started attacking him, saying some things that just hit too close to the mark. Whether he meant it or not, Poe just lost it. They yelled at each other. Poe said… well, things he shouldn’t have, like how Rey had probably left because she realized what a idiot he really was before all of them had and how she was right doing so. And then Ben punched him. Hard. So hard he left a huge purple bruise around Poe’s left eye. That had been the end of the argument. 

A couple of weeks later, when Poe’s bruised eye and bruised ego had diminished, he tried calling Ben, but it was for nothing. He wouldn’t take his calls or answer any of his messages or emails. He tried looking for him in college, but the tall brooding man had just turned his back on him over and over again, so after a while he just… gave up. It wasn’t by far one of his proudest moments.

“And…” Rey urged, snapping Poe from the reverie of memories.

“We fought, I tried to talk to him sometime later. He never answered. That was two years ago. We never spoke again.” He shot her a sad smile. “So, as I said. Even if I wanted to, I won’t tell.” 

Honestly, Poe  _ wanted _ to tell Ben about it. He didn’t think it was fair Ben not knowing about a thing like that. Hell, if it was happening with him, he’d  _ want _ to know! But…

But Poe couldn’t push past the tiny voice in his head telling him that Ben wasn’t the same anymore. That he might not even believe him, or worst, that he might do something stupid if he found out. Leia didn’t trust that Snoke man and Poe didn’t either. He had done something to Ben’s head. As much as it hurt him to admit, Poe didn’t know Ben anymore. He didn’t know how the new Ben would react to all of it. Poe wouldn’t be the one to blame if suddenly Ben decided to take the tiny girl with dark braids from her mother in a fit of rage. He’d never forgive himself if something like that happened.

Rey was quiet for a long time, staring down at her own hands and he could see she was doing her best to hold herself not to cry. Poe rested a comforting hand over hers and smiled softly before looking away. Rey eventually sniffed and rubbed her face with both her hands, letting out a humorless laugh.  

“Force.” She mumbled, in a breath. “That’s just…. Force.” 

“Insane right?” Poe couldn’t agree more. 

“I can…” She mumbled, trying to get a grip on her overwhelming emotions. “I can check your car later.” She offered with a watery smile. “After my shift here ends.” 

“ _ No _ , no need.” He answered truthfully. “I don’t want to make you work over hours just for me. It will be too late to drive home anyway.” 

“Let’s have dinner.” She offered, biting her lower lip. “Since you’re staying.”

“I don’t want to impose, I’m sure you need to sleep, or something.” He mumbled, looking back at the counter, where Hannah was sitting, licking her ice cream cone happily. 

“Nonsense!” She waved him off. “Hannah is a terrible sleeper anyway. Maz always gives me some take-outs for dinner, since I really can’t cook all that well…”

“I remember the browny incident.” He said, making her laugh. 

“It’ll be fun. Come on.” She mumbled, smiling at him. “We have so much to talk about. Please, I miss the company.” Her sad eyes were his ruin and he nodded. 

“Yeah, okay.” 

 

Poe had dinner in Rey’s small flat that evening, sitting in the couch with Rey and Hannan while the little girl watched cartoons and they laughed at old and new tales exchanged between them. She fixed his car in the morning and he was back in D’Qar campus a little after lunch. 

Laying down in his bed with his phone in hand, still half shocked from the past occurrences, he contemplated many possibilities. He first considered calling Ben. He actually typed the number at least three times before, and actually called once,  hanging up before it could ring twice. But the small voice kept whispering in his ear and he lost the nerve every time. Then he considered calling Leia. Yeah, Leia should know about her grand-child, right? But should he be the one to tell her? Lastly, he considered calling his mother. Sure, she had nothing to do with the mess, but at least she would know what to do. His mother always knew what to do. 

In the end Poe decided it was none of his business. 

So it was half a wonder when he found himself stopping by Takodana when he was returning from his Christmas break, bringing gifts for Rey and Hannah. Or when he stopped by during his summer vacations. Or when he took a weekend off to visit. In a blink of an eye he stopped being Mr. Dameron and became uncle Poe. After a while, his little visits to Rey and Hannah became routine and he would take the nowhere road to Takodana at least three times of year to see them. 

Hannah quickly won his heart. She had a quick temper and was as stubborn as both or her parents, but was lovable, intelligent and witty. Poe honestly enjoyed spending time with her and he had missed Rey in the time she had left. He’d end up find himself buying all sorts of gifts to take to the girl when he visited, much to Rey’s nerve, since he was, as she said, “buying her daughter off”. He even went to Rey’s graduation ceremony and when she called saying she got a job, he helped her find a house in Chandrila and offered to help with the moving. 

“You look taller.” He said, looking Hannah up and down. “You’re almost as tall as I am. When did this happen?” He turned from the 15-year-old to her mother. “What are you feeding this child with?

“That’s what happens when you spend a year without visiting.” Rey said, patting his shoulder. “Through I’m pretty sure I’m gonna blink and she’ll be taller then me.”

“Why didn’t you bring BB with you?” Hannah questioned looking around for the pet in question.

“I only can visit when I bring my dog along, that’s how it works now?” He asked, rolling his eyes dramatically and the teenager side-eyed him, knowing just how much Poe loved his orange corgi. “Okay, I was going to, but your mother told me not to.” 

“Mom! Why?” Hannah cried. “He misses me!” 

“Thanks Poe.” Rey mumbled sarcastically.

“That’s what I’m here for.” He smirked, making Rey roll her eyes. 

“You were not going to be of any help if BB’s here.” Rey said, patting her daughter’s head. “After it’s done, you can take BB out for a walk whenever you want.”

“Seriously?” Her eyes gleamed as she looked from Rey to Poe, who shrugged. “Awesome!”

“Now help finish getting these up.” Rey pointed at the boxes waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs, making her growl. 

“I brought alcohol.” Poe said as he followed Rey into the kitchen and handling her the pack of beers. “How’s she taking the moving?”   

“As well as I could have hoped for.” Rey sighed, leaning into the counter. “She says she’s super happy with it but I think she’s kind of upset leaving Maz and Takodana behind. It’s not that easy for her to accept change as she may say.”

“Reminds you of someone, no?” Poe said, making Rey shoot him an angry look. “Just like…”

“Don’t.” She said in a low growl, the conversation being a familiar one by now.

“Maybe now that you’re back in Chandrila, you…” 

“Stop it.” She snapped, putting her fists down in the balcony hard, making Poe look at her with wide eyes. “I’m serious, don’t.” Poe only lifted his hands in surrender. “I already have trouble enough with Hannah about this subject, don’t you start on it too.”

“Okay, okay.” Poe mumbled, shaking his head. “I won’t say anything.” 

Rey closed her eyes and sighed deeply. 

“Thank you.” She mumbled when she opened them again. “Can you give me a hand here?” She asked, getting on top of a chair that was sitting close to an open cabinet and Poe started handling her utensils from the open box. “So, how’s that boyfriend thing of yours?” 

“No boyfriend thing anymore.” Poe said, shaking his head. 

“Ah, sorry.” Rey mumbled, looking down at her friend with sad eyes and a pot in her hands. 

“Don’t be.” Poe answered with a smirk. “He was an idiot.” 

“You seem to have a type.” She said with a laugh. “All of them end up being jerks.”  

“I would be offended, if it wasn’t true.” Poe acknowledged with a sigh. “Alas, now that you are not living in the middle of nowhere anymore maybe it’s time for you to start going out some more, meet some people, have some fun.” He wiggled his eyebrows making her laugh. 

“I don’t know, Poe…” 

“When was the last time you had sex, Rey?” He asked, and before she could say anything, he added. “With your hand doesn’t count.” She closed her mouth. “Nor with a vibrator.”

“It’s been a while.” Rey confessed, staring straight at the open cabinet in front of her. “But I’m not in the mood for dating or flirting or anything.”

“Alright, you don’t have to.” He said, handling her a stack of plates. “But let’s go have some fun, meet new people.”

“What about Hannah?” She asked, biting her bottom lip. 

“Hannah is 15. I’m sure she’ll be very much fine alone at home for one night.” He argued. 

“I don’t know Poe…” 

“We’re going out on friday and I’m going to introduce you to some of my friends and you will have some fun outside of watching sitcoms and playing games with your daughter.” He said and his tone was final. “You’re gonna put on a nice clothes, some make-up and we’ll go dancing. Did I make myself clear?”

“Alright, okay.” She mumbled in surrender. “Friday?”

“Yes friday.” He nodded, passing her another pot. “It gives you two days to psychologically prepare to it. And I promise it will be fun.”

“Okay. Friday.” She nodded. “But tonight I promised Hannah we would order pizza and watch some TV. Want in?”  

“Sure, it’s not like I have anything better to be doing anyway.” He said shrugging and ducked when Rey threw a ball of wrapping at him, laughing. 

“Are you two going to continue playing in there or is anyone going to help me carry heavy shit up the stairs?” Hannah said, standing at the door with her hands on her hips, her pose ridiculously similar to her grandmother’s.

“Language honey.” Rey said, only half serious. Rey didn’t have much morale to reprimand Hannah about cursing, since most of the curse words her daughter knew were her fault. Poe was laughing out loud at the face Hannah made at her mother. 

“Okay, I’m going to help you , big friendly giant.” He said, looping his arm around Hannah’s.

“HEY!” Rey heard her say from the living room. “How dare you…”

She returned to her task of putting things in place, smiling at the friendly banter coming from the living room. 

It might take some time to get used to the new home, but they’d be alright. They always managed.  

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo what do you think?   
> Please leave comments with your thoughts, crictics, feel free to yell at me if you want.   
> Feel free to also come yell at me my tumblr - Stars-of-kyber (how do I put a link on that?)- I love talking with people.  
> Lots of love   
> Cee


	4. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey goes out and Hannah uses that time to go through her stolen yearbook and look for answers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello my friends, her I am again, updating on time another chapter for you!  
> How I am still writing this is a wonder, and if I'm being very honest, a miracle. I have to thank my two Brunas (Dorneles and Chaves) a lot for all the support they're giving me. <3  
> I'm currently writing chapter 5, and as after tomorrow I won't be working anymore (bummer), I'll have more time to work on it (yey)  
> So, no more chatter, here it is, one more chapter, written with lots of love from me to you.  
> Cee

“How do I look?” Rey asked Hannah, who was sitting in her mother’s bed, legs crossed and hair pulled up in a bun while Rey tried different outfits. It was friday night and Poe was coming to pick Rey up in half an hour with his friends and she didn’t have what to wear. 

“You want daughter me or honest me?” Hannah replied. 

“Wait, your daughter you is not your honest you?” Rey asked, making the young girl roll her eyes.

“Mom...” 

“Alright, honest, please.” Rey said, turning around in the selected outfit of the time. “Hit me up, I can take it.”

“You look like you’re a soccer mom in your 50’s.” Hannah said truthfully. 

“What?!” 

“That blouse looks stupid and you’re wearing mom jeans and all-stars.” Rey looked downright offended at her daughter. “You said honest.”

“But I like this blouse.” The older woman said, looking at herself in the mirror.

“Well, it looks stupid.” Hannah shrugged. 

“It’s been a while since I’ve done that.” Rey said, pulling her blouse off, and kicking her jeans to the corner of the room. “Like, since High School.” 

“Okay, you’re clearly not fit for this job. Go put on some make-up, I’ll see if I can find something.” The young girl said, shooing her mother to the bathroom.  

“Since when do you know anything about dressing up to go out?” Rey asked, raising her eyebrows as she was pushed off the room. 

“Just go!” With a ruff, Rey closed the door of the bathroom behind her, leaving the girl alone in the room.

Hannah had been looking for some time alone since she first found Rey’s old yearbooks, but between the moving and her mother overcompensating for thinking she was upset with the moving, she couldn’t find a minute to herself. She didn’t mind her mother’s company, but the memory of that red leather book sitting in her closet was burnt in her brain and it was killing her! So when her mother had announced she was going out with uncle Poe and some of his friends, Hannah saw the perfect opportunity for some time alone to look through the damn thing. The only hard time is actually getting her mother out of the house. 

“I don’t know, Hanni.” She could hear Rey saying from the closed door. “This all sounds so stupid.” 

“What does?” Hannah replied, looking over her mother’s drawer of pants. What really sounded stupid is that a woman with such nice long legs like her mother only owns baggy mom jeans. That’s stupid. If Hannah had legs like her mother’s, she’d want to show them off all the time. 

“All this going out thing.” She said. “Dressing up and going to clubs. It always felt kind of stupid.” 

“What, you weren’t a clubbing person as a teen?” She asked, completely giving up on the pants drawer and moving to look for a nice top. 

“I was in the Robotics club, honey.” Rey said, her voice betraying her humor. 

“So what, nerds can’t have fun anymore?” She replied, fumbling through her mother’s blouses. Right there in the bottom corner of it, hidden like it wasn’t even meant to be there, was a fitted silver top with a cleavage that clearly could only be used by a small breasted person. Perfect. 

“We would just go to Poe’s and get drunk on his basement. Going out was too much work.” Rey laughed from the bathroom. “I did go to prom, does it count?” 

“Fancy dress and corsage and all?” Hannah asked, setting the top in the bed. 

“Yup. And all.” It was strange to imagine her mother, the one always in overalls and smeared in grease or dirt, as a teen all dressed up and fancy to prom. She heard Rey’s laughter coming from the bathroom. “Though we didn’t stay for the whole thing cuz Be…” she cut off in the middle of the sentence, a sudden silence taking over. 

“What? What happened?” Hannah asked, opening the door to the bathroom. Her mother was staring at the mirror, her mascara in hands, her face only half done. She looked pale despite the make-up, like she had just seen something that scared her.  When she saw Hannah standing in the door, she smiled again, like nothing had happened. 

“It was nothing.” She shrugged. “I shouldn’t tell you these stuff and give you any ideas. You haven’t even started High School.”

“So, did you give your parents a fair share of white hair as a teen?” Hannah asked, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “And you’re worried I’m gonna turn out as bad as you?” 

“I…” Her mother looked taken aback by the question. Her eyes grew wide and kind of sad, as they always did when Hannah tried to mention anything from her past before Hannah was born. 

“Okay, bad subject, sorry I asked.” Hannah said bitterly after a full minute of silence from her mother’s side. “Pretend like I didn’t.”

“Sorry.” Rey said, blushing like a teenager, her eyes still half hunted. “It wasn’t really a troublemaker anyways.” 

“I don’t buy it.” Hannah said with a smirk. “You look like you skipped classes to smoke weed with uncle Poe.”

“Okay that was one time and it wasn’t nearly as fun as I thought it would be.” Rey said, making the tip of her daughter’s ears go completely red. 

“Force, mom!” She said, rubbing her face in her hands to make the heat go away. “I was joking.”

“I wasn’t.” Rey said, mimicking Hannah’s earlier smirk. 

“I’m so done with you.” The young girl said, rolling her eyes. “I’m gonna go and try to find you some decent pants.” And as she left the room and took on the hallway she yelled. “You should be ashamed of yourself!”

“Whatever you say, honey!” Rey yelled back, laughing at her daughter’s old dramatic overturn.

Rey finished her make-up in silence, thinking back to Hannah’s earlier comment about her parents. It wasn’t a subject she talked about and she never fully explained to her daughter anything about her past. Maybe it was a bad idea, but Rey didn’t want the 15-year-old to suffer about things that were in the past, dead and gone. She already suffered enough for both of them and besides, Hannah was too sensible. Rey knew that the subject would only affect her daughter negatively. Rey would take as many blows as necessary to keep Hannah safe and happy.     

She knew Hannah craved a family as much as she did when she was the girl’s age. The lack of information about her father and grandparents hadn’t bothered her until the age of 5, being content with Rey, Maz and the occasional visit from Poe. But with the beginning of kindergarten and the beginning of the realization that family wasn’t exactly like that came the questioning. 

It had begun lightly, with one  _ “Mama, why don’t I have a Daddy like my friends from school?”.  _  Rey had that scene pressed into her memory and she could never forget it, even if she wanted to. She could repeat every word of that conversation in her brain. Hannah had stared at her, big hazel eyes not sad, but curious. She just wanted to know why, so Rey set down in the bed with her and explained that not every family is the same, and theirs is different because it’s just her and her mommy. For the time, it seemed to suit the childish curiosity of a five-year-old, but as time begun to pass and Hannah begun to see more and more of other families, things got more and more complicated to handle. 

It all began with her refusing to get up to school in one particular morning when she was seven. She was not normally problematic about school so it made Rey worried. She only figured it out when the little girl begun to cry in the shower. After some coaching from her mother, she admitted that she didn’t want to go because it was Father’s day celebration and it didn’t make sense for her to be there since she didn’t have a father. Rey had relented after that and even took the day off so they could have a special mother-and-daughter day. 

After that came the  _ “My sciences teacher told us that everyone has to have a father.” _ some months after, which forced Rey to admit that, yes, she had a father, but he wasn’t with them anymore, so it was just the two of them. After that day, Hannah became somewhat rebellious about the whole family theme. It started with questioning. She would ask question after question after question about her father in the hope Rey would tell her  _ something _ . What was he like, was he tall, did he have black hair, where did you meet him, why did he leave us, is he still alive? Rey never told her anything, apart from one day when she let it slip that Hannah looked like him, which fueled a whole lot more questioning that Rey didn’t have the guts or the mind to answer. After some time the unanswered questions started making Hannah angry, and everytime the subject of her father was brought up, a fight would break.     

The rest of her family subject wasn’t as problematic as her father’s. Hannah seemed to notice how much it upset her mother, and most of the time, would let the subject drop after a question or three.

Rey let out a sad sigh and went out to her bedroom, to come face to face with Hannah holding a pair of high-waisted jeans shorts and Rey’s old silver top that she hadn’t worn since before Hannah was born and she had no idea why she kept it. 

“I’m not wearing that!” Rey said scandalized, making Hannah roll her eyes.

“Do you wanna look like the hot 35-year-old you are or like a 50-year-old soccer mom with three kids who gets drunk on margaritas at brunch?”

“You are very mean, have I ever told you that?” Rey said, making a face at the girl. 

“Yes, I’m aware.” Hannah said with a nod. “You’re partially to blame since you’re the one who raised me, though.”

Hannah looked ridiculously much like Ben physically, there was no mistaking that. But those who knew Hannah and who had known Ben (that meaning Rey and Poe) could see just how much Hannah really resembled him. Her quick to anger temperament and her dry sense of humor had clearly come from her father. She was just as stubborn as her mother, but wasn’t as smiley and friendly as her female progenitor. Hannah was quiet and brody since she was a baby, had anger bouts when things upset her or didn’t go her way and had trouble making friends at school. Rey had been called by the school because Hannah would sit at the recess on her own at a corner, but according to her daughter, she liked it better this was. She also had been called, twice, because Hannah had hit one of her classmates, to which her daughter responded saying they were stupid and annoying her. 

Clearly just like her father. 

If Rey was being completely honest, which she usually wasn’t when it came to that subject, she missed Ben.

It worried Rey sometimes and she usually had to remind herself that as much alike as they were Hannah  _ was not _ Ben. 

“I think I’m not going.” Rey said, eyeing her daughter and the clothes she was holding to her. 

“Don’t be silly mom, come on.” Hannah said, shoving the clothing in her mother’s hands. “You have the right to go out and have some fun.”

“Are you going to be alright here on your own?” She questioned, pulling on tight blouse. 

“Of course I will. I have a wonderful night planned ahead of me.” She said, throwing herself on the bed. 

“What is your wonderful plan?” Rey asked, as she put on the shorts. 

“I’m planning on making some popcorn and marathoning American Gods on Amazon Prime until I fall asleep or finish the first season of it. I think I might fall asleep first, since each episode is like an hour long, but who knows.”

“I feel like one of those sluts from teenage movies.” Rey said, looking herself up and down the mirror.

Hannah looked at her mother. The top fit just right and the shorts showed her legs perfectly just as she planned. “You look hot.”

“I’m not hot.” Rey scoffed, rolling her eyes. 

“Yeah, you keep telling yourself that.” Her daughter said as she turned her back on her and started shuffling through Rey’s shoes. “Now we just have to see what shoes to wear.” 

“What’s wrong with my all-starts?”

“I was thinking heels, what you think?” The young girl said, completely ignoring Rey’s question. 

“I’m too tall, it’s going to look stupid.”

“You’re gonna look so hot in these!” Hannah mumbled, with a big smile, pulling the pair of half closed high heels her mother had bought for her graduation ceremony.

“I don’t know, Hanni...” 

“Why do you keep arguing with me? Just put the damn things on!” Rey huffed as she set on the bed to put on the shoes. “Uncle Poe’s gonna be here soon, so we just have to...Ahh.” Hannah pulled the pins tying Rey’s hair up and smiled. “There, amazing. Now just stop looking like someone’s making you drink piss and every eye on that club’s gonna be on you.” 

“I don’t want every eye on the club on me Hannah.” Rey said with a stern look. “I’m just going because Poe’s bothering me so much to that I don’t know any other ways say no anymore.”

“Ah mah, come on!” Hannah said as they made their way to the kitchen. “You had like 15 years of house arrest and babysitting duty. Now it’s your time to have some fun.”

“Do you honestly think that taking ca...” Her mother begun, looking torn between offended and hurt by Hannah’s comment, making the teenager’s heart squeeze painfully in her chest, when the doorbell rang. Hannah always ended up feeling bad for making her mother hurt, that would never change. The two women stared at each other for a moment before Rey gave her one final gesture of “this conversation is not over”, before turning to open the door.  

“You look amazing!” Poe said with a bright smile. His beloved black Ford X-Wing, a piece he owned since high school and cherished, even though it was known to leave him hanging from time to time, was parked in front of the house and a blonde girl was sitting in the passenger seat, reading through her phone. “You picked your clothes yourself?” He asked, looking at her in amazement as he kissed Hannah’s cheek. “Hey pixie.” 

“She was planning on dressing like she was going for a book club meeting.” Hannah said with an smirk. “But I managed the crisis, as you can clearly see.” 

“Very good work, pixie.” Poe said, approvingly. “Very good indeed. I’m proud.”

“I hate the two of you.” Rey said with a ruff, making the pair laugh.

“Okay, let’s go so we can grab a table and stuff.” Poe said, patting the top of Hannah’s head, making her ruff with annoyance. 

“You said your friends are going but there’s only one person in the car.” Rey said, crossing her arms in front of her chest, in a motion Hannah was sure was to hide the cleavage of the top.

“That’s Connix.” He smirked. “She lives closer to me so we ride together. Finn, Paige and Rose are already on their way.” He looked at his phone and placed it back in his pant’s pocket. “And we’ll be late if we don’t get going.” 

“Alright, alright.” Rey said, rolling her eyes. She placed a kiss on Hannah’s forehead. “You’re going to be alright on your own, yeah?” 

“For the uptenth time, yes, mother, I’ll be fine.” She said, returning her mother’s affectioned hug. 

“Love you, Hanni.” 

“Love you too mom. Now…” The younger girl said, holding her mother’s shoulders. “Go out and have some fun. That’s an order.”

“I’m going!” Rey laughed, following Poe out of the house. 

“Don’t get too drunk and don’t have unprotected sex!” She called from the door. 

“Hannah!” She heard her mother scandalized exclamation as she closed the door and she could hear Poe’s loud laughter even with the doors closed.

  
  


Hannah had to restrain herself from running up to her bedroom as soon as she heard uncle Poe’s car pulling out. There was still a chance her mother would bail or come back for something she’d forgotten, so she had to go with her story of popcorn and TV, at least for the first five minutes. 

She wondered around the kitchen, like she had nothing better to be doing, scrolling through her phone as she waited for the microwave start to beep. Then, as if she didn’t have anything better to do, she made her way to her bedroom, shutting the door behind her. Leaving the bow of popcorn forgotten on her nightstand, she rushed to the bottom drawer where she had hidden the yearbook. Hannah hadn’t had the time to go anywhere near it, and lucky for her, neither had Rey. 

Carefully, as if it was sacred, she carried the red leather covered book and settled it on top of her bed. 

It took her almost five minutes staring at its cover for her to get the courage to open it.  What if her father didn’t go to the same school as her mother? What if she didn’t find anything? Or worst, what if she didn’t like what she found inside it? She hadn’t considered any possibilities before, in her crazy anticipation to look through it. 

Before she could lose the nerve and shove the book back in its hiding place, Hannah turned the cover open. 

She came face to face with the same page she had quickly inspected before, with her mother’s writing across it. After a quick look, she turned the next one, flipping through the pages of pictures until she could find one her mother was in. 

It was not hard to recognize her mother as a teenager, since she hadn’t changed all that much. The first picture she found was one with the robotics team, Rey with a big smile and a three-buns hair-do, wrapped in the blue coat Hannah found in the box and arm-to-arm with a dark skinned girl. After a quick look in the subtitles under the picture she found the girl was one “Jessika Pava”, whom she never heard of, of course. 

Her mother had gained weight since 2002. She was still thin, but teen Rey looked about to break, like she had missed a meal or three almost everyday. It didn’t sit with well  Hannah. Her mother wasn’t one to refuse food or to diet. Though much could have changed in 15 years, of course. She didn’t know if 18-year-old Rey would follow society’s fashion trends. She didn’t know 18-year-old Rey at all. Eighteen-year-old Rey was not her mother yet, she had to remind herself. 

The next person she found in the yearbook was uncle Poe. Though he had changed some since his high-school years, his trademark smirk and warm eyes were unmistakable as she stared at a picture of the football team. She nearly fell out of bed laughing when she found a prom picture of him on top of a stage wearing the “Prom King” crown and a seash and waving like a Miss Universe. 

The other picture of her mother she found was her individual picture, young Rey Jones smiling at the camera in front of a blue background.  Hannah ran her hand over the picture, taking everything she could in. The bright smile and the freckles over her nose and checks. The way she put her hair up. The way her eyes shone. Hannah wished she had met her mother as a teen. She seemed like a nice person to be friends with. 

It also explained why she had a jacket written Jones in it. It wasn’t a friend’s, it was hers. She was Jones. Which only unravelled a whole bunch of other questions, like did she change her name to Thompson and what had lead her to it.

The last pages of the yearbook were signed with well wishes and silly texts about how they would miss each other after the end of High-School. The one Jessika Pava, who was hugging her mother in the Robotics Club picture, left an almost entire page of text saying how much she meant to her and telling her they could count with one another in college. One Snap Wexley said she was the “best damn mechanic in Chandrila and any place was lucky to have her” and that he would miss her while he was studying abroad and Uncle Poe wrote a bunch of non-senses and jokes about how they would rock college together. Other smaller and less significant well-wishes and “it was good to meet you” scattered the pages. 

Taped to the back cover of the yearbook was a picture of five people on fancy party clothes behind an arch of balloons. Probably the prom her mother had mentioned attending. A tall chubby guy was in the left, his arm around the girl Hannah knew to be Jessika Pava, who was hugging the chubby boy in the left and uncle Poe in the right, who was using a fancy tux and a  bright smile in his face, his hair pulled back with a ton of hair gel and his arm around Jessyka and her mother. 

Her mother looked ridiculously gorgeous in a navy blue long dress, with a slit in the bottom, showcasing the lower part of her left leg. It was the most fancy she even saw Rey wear. She was wearing simple makeup and her hair was done in an fancy complicated hairdo. Next to her mother was the last person of the photo and Hannah’s attention caught on him the moment her eyes landed on the mop of black hair. 

He was very tall, with dark long hair and pale skin. Hannah noticed the tip of his ears coming out of his hair and his long nose. She couldn’t see many details because he wasn’t looking at the person taking the picture, but at Rey, his arm wrapped around her waist. He was staring at her the way people stared at each other in silly romantic comedies, like there’s nothing he’d rather be looking at then that woman right in front of him. 

That guy… he could be the one Hannah was looking for. It matched the “you look like him” thing her mother always said. Tall with dark hair and fair skin with long gangly limbs and too big ears; 

Hannah’s heart almost stopped beating in her chest, or what it beating so hard she barely could feel it? She couldn’t tell. With ragged breaths and shaking hands, she carefully took the picture from the yearbook, turning it around to see if she could find a name or a description or something that could use. 

In the back of the photo was written “D’qar class of 2008 and Snap”.

Snap. It was a start. A name for her to look for. Snap Wexley had signed on her mother’s book. He said he was going abroad. Maybe that’s what happened? He left town before her mother could tell him she was pregnant? Or maybe she wouldn’t want to tell him and ruin his studies abroad? Or maybe she did tell him and he left anyways? 

Hannah’s excitement burst when she found the individual pictures and she found that one “Temmim Wexley” was, in fact, the chubby guy hugging Jessika on the left corner of the picture, which lead Hannah back to the mystery dark haired man looking at her mother like she had hung the moon. 

Using the prom picture to guide her, she went through the individual pictures one by one, looking carefully at each of them until she found what she was looking for. 

There was little doubt Ben Solo was the person she was looking for the moment she set her eyes on his individual picture. He wasn’t smiling in it, just staring at the camera in front of him like he’d rather be doing anything but be sitting there. Her similarities with the man were hard to miss. From the coloring to the long face and big ears to the frown, as it all bored him very much. 

That was it. That man might be the person she’d been looking for since she was a kid. The one she dreamed about before going to bed. Hannah could barely breath. Running her fingers softly through the picture, staring at the grumpy man in the photo, who might as well be her father. Tears threatened to fall from her eyes and she cursed herself for being so stupid. 

She still didn’t know anything about him. All she had was a name. She didn’t know why he wasn’t around, what happened before she was born. From the prom picture he seemed to care for Rey very much, but it was just one picture. So many people have beautiful instagrams and shitty lives. For all she cared, he could be an ass, who dumped her mother after she found out she was pregnant. Hell she didn’t even know for sure if he was really her father. 

Even though trying to damper her excitement with her discovery, Hannah couldn't help to search for him around the yearbook pictures. There was one of him in the drama club and another where he was standing next to Poe, after what it seemed after a football game. In neither he seemed to be smiling, just a shift in the lower lip that could be mistaken for a frown. 

Hannah spent the next two hours examining every detail she could of the yearbook. Saving every detail she could about this Ben Solo guy to memory. Staring at her mother’s happy smile in the pictures. She seemed happier, less tired, less worn out. Life did that to people, she supposed, and being a single mother. Hannah didn’t doubt her mother was the strongest person she knew and how she managed to be an upbeat and positive person about everything still wondered her. Hannah just wished she met this one happier version of her. The one Rey before Hannah, before two jobs and night college and everything else. 

When she started feeling her eyes close and her head drop despite her best efforts, she closed the book, setting it back in its hiding spot, placing it under several layers of clothing, where her mother, hopefully, would not find it. 

She layed back down in bed, staring at the sealing. She needed to make sure she was right. She couldn’t afford running after him only to find out she chasing after the wrong person. She had to be sure. And she knew exactly who to ask. 

Hannah fell asleep thinking of her father, and for the first time, she had a face to dream of. 

 

“Hanni.” Hannah woke up startled, blinking at her mother’s face in the dim light. Her face was rubbed clean and she was wearing a long shirt and pajama shorts. “Move, will you?” She rushed to the side, allowing Rey some space in the small bed. Still half asleep, she wrapped her arms around the woman, burying her face in her neck like she did when she was little and they didn’t have an option but to share a bed. 

“Mhumm.” She yawned, looking at the clock on the bedside table. 3:12. “How was your night?” 

“It was fun.” Rey said, running her hand through the daughter’s hair. “Yours?” 

“Was nice.” 

“You know that you’re not just an obligation to me right?” Rey said into her hair. “I never ever regretted anything I did for you.” 

“Mom…” 

“I’m serious, Hannah.” She said, pulling her daughter’s chin up so they could look at each other. “I love you more than anything, you know that?”

Hannah snuggled closer to her mother, tears swelling up in her eyes. 

“I know mom.” She mumbled, hiding her face in the older woman’s neck. “I love you too. So much.” 

“You’re my little baby.” Rey whispered, running  her hand through the girl’s hair. “you’ll always be.” 

They both fell asleep hugging each other in the slim bed, both of them nearly falling off the bed, but close together. Just like old times.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So??? What you think???  
> I honestly don't really know exactly how a yearbook is, so I based it on my knowledge of high school movies lol  
> If you're liking the story and is able to, please take a minute of your time and tell your friends about it! I'd be very happy if you could! If you don't like it, feel free to come talk to me about it, so I can do better next time.  
> If you find a mistake in the content, yell at Bruna. Lol jk, tell me so I can fix it.  
> Kudos and comments warm my heart and brightnen my day.  
> Lots of love and until we meet again  
> Come talk to me on tumblr!! Stars-of-kyber  
> Cee


	5. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannah pressures Poe and he ends up talking too much, and giving Hannah some important information.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello my loves! Here we are again, with one more chapter.  
> Remember I said I'd have more free time? Well I was wrong, this week was crazy, but still I'm here with another chapter on time!  
> Lots of love for my two Brunas for their support and for all of you who have been reading. Ily <3  
> Enjoy

Poe Dameron was sitting in the bench of the park, scrolling through his phone with his overweight orange corgi lying lazily by his feet, when the dog swiftly lift his head, and, in a move, got up and ran towards the tall figure coming his way, whistling to the dog.

“Hey BB, buddy!” Hannah mumbled, happily kneeling on the grass so the corgi could lick her face and jump up and down on her leg, shaking his little butt with happiness. “I know, I know. Poe has been a meany and haven’t let us see each other in so long.”

“Hey, not fair.” The man said, crossing his arms in front of his chest. “I’m here, ain’t I?!”

“Look at how he missed me, you mean you!” She said, blinking up at him with her usual dramatic big hazel eyes.

“You used to skype me to talk to my dog, Hannah.” He said, frowning at her. He could be as dramatic and the 15-year-old, if he wanted to. “I’m the one who should be offended.”

“You don’t need to be jealous, uncle Poe.” She said, standing up and side-hugging him, with a cocky smirk. “I have enough love for both of you.”

“I should damn right hope so.” He scoffed, lifting his nose, looking away from her. “I’m a very exigent person regarding love, right, beebs?” BB8 barked happily, wiggling his tail, his thong out. “Also I brought us cupcakes. You should love me.”

“How long it’s been since this evil meany has taken you out for a proper walk?” She asked, scratching the dog’s head and ignoring Poe’s bribes. “You’re a little ball of fat.”

“He’s a lazy ass, that’s what.” Poe said, scoffing. “Sometimes I almost have to drag him out of the house by the leash. Also he steals food.” He gave the dog a menacing side eye.

“Do you walk him every day?” She asked, as they started walking towards the big stone fountain.

“I work every day Hannah.” He said, rolling his eyes, allowing her to take the dog’s cord . “Adult responsibility and stuff. I walk him three times a week.”

“I could walk him some days for you.” She offered with a smile. “When you’re like busy being an adult and stuff.”

“Why are you being so helpful and all that?” He asked, side-eyeing the teenager, who he knew was not the biggest fan of exercise. “Is it because I brought sweets?”

“Because I love your dog and want to spend time with him, since now I, like, don’t like 5 hours away and, thus, can?” She asked, not exactly meeting his eyes.

“And that’s the only reason?” He asked, as they made their way over a grassy patch, filled with people enjoying the sunny day and children running around enjoying the few last days of .

“Well…” She said, biting the inside of her cheek. She halted to a stop, and set down on the grass, patting her side so Poe would join her. After his owner was comfortably seated, BB8 smelled his surroundings and layed on the grass, his paws up in the air, his thong hanging out from the corner of his mouth, ignoring the tense moment going around him. “I needed to talk to you.” She said, rubbing the corgi’s belly without looking up at Poe. “Away from Mom.”

“Oh shit, what did you do?” He asked with a grown and a frown.

“I didn’t DO anything.” She said, toying with the dog’s collar. “I mean, I did _something_ , but it’s not...” She trailed off.”

“What is it, Hannah?”

“Did you know my father?” She asked and looked up, waiting for the answer, but Poe’s face went completely white and he was just blinking at her. “Uncle Poe?”

“Fuck.” He mumbled softly, shaking his head. “Fuck, no, Hannah, this is forbidden territory, you know that. Why do you want to talk about this _now_ ? _What did you do?!_ ” He looked at her horrified.

“I think I might have found him.”

“You think you WHAT?!” He half yelled, making several people turn to stare at him. “How did you…? How do you know he is…? Did your mother…? _Kriff_ Hannah did you talk to him?!”

“No!” She shook her head, holding Poe by the arm. “Calm down, please, let me explain.”

Poe strengthened his back, took a deep breath and pulled a box of cupcakes from his bag, taking one and offering the box to Hannah, who took one and started fondling with the wrapper without looking at him. BB8’s ears twitched, smelling the sweet, but Poe closed the box before the dog could drag himself closer to it. Upset, the corgi dragged himself to Hannah’s lap, laying down between her crossed legs.

“Explain.” He said, giving the young girl a pointed look.

“Well, it all started during the moving really. You know I always wanted to know who my father is. I mean, it’s like a part of me is missing and it’s not fair!” She complained, closing her hands into fists. “I just needed to know. Is it that hard?” Poe opened his mouth to reply but she didn’t give him time to say anything. “So when I was carrying some boxes to the attic, I mean, we have an attic, do you know that?”

“Yeah…” Was all he managed to say, before she lifted her hand to interrupt him.

“Gee, uncle Poe. Let me finish talking, please!” She scoffed, shaking her head. “So, I was taking this box to the attic and it says ‘High School Stuff’, but, like, I haven’t even started High School yet, right? So I think it must be my mother’s! So I opened it.”

“Christ Hannah…” He mumbled, receiving an angry look from the teenager. He lifted his hands in surrender. He knew Rey had the box of stuff, because after she left, he kept them. The old landlady gave Ben the things Rey had left behind in her apartment and Ben had asked Poe to get rid of them, but Poe was a sentimental guy and he didn’t have the courage to burn them, like his friend had suggested. After he met Rey again in Takodana, he offered to give them back to her.

“I know I shouldn’t, okay?!” She said with a pout. “I know it’s my mother’s stuff and I shouldn’t go through it without her authorization, but, uncle Poe, I needed to know! Wouldn’t you want to know, if it was with you?” Poe didn’t answer this time. “Wouldn’t you, uncle Poe?”

“Yes…?” He finally said, when he realized she was waiting for him to say anything. Satisfied with answer, she nodded and kept talking.

“So, in this box there were these old yearbooks and _God_ it was finally some information, after 15 years in the dark you know? So I kinda took and and hid it in my room so I could take a look at it.”

“You what?!” He asked, but she ignored his exclamation.

“I mean, am I going insane uncle Poe?” She asked, exasperatedly. “Is it crazy that I want to know this person. I mean I don’t even know what he’s like.” She sighted. “Anyway. I was going through it and I found this.” She pulled the folded picture from her pocket and offered it to him. “That’s it, right? The answer I was looking for?”

Poe started at the picture in his hand, quite no believing what he was seeing, his eyes almost reverent while he looked at the younger version of himself and his friends. They had been so happy then, a week before graduation. None of them knew what was waiting for them. At the time, Poe was just happy he was finally leaving school, finally _college_. He had no idea that he would lose most of his very best friends in the coming years. He hadn’t seen Snap in ages, losing contact with the chubby man sometime after he moved away. The last he heard from him was he was getting married in Avika Prime. He had invited Poe for the wedding, but it was the middle of election rush and he had no way to make an international trip three weeks before voting. Rey had gone missing roughly a month after that picture was taken, and he only found her again five years after that, by pure chance. Ben was… well, Ben. And he still talked to Jessika from time to time, but both of them always seemed to get tangled in work and responsibility to do anything more than text a meme or a silly joke to the other every other month.

Poe honestly _missed_ high school. If anyone told 17-year-old himself that he would find himself _missing school_ , he’d crack up laughing right in the person’s face.

“That’s Temmin ‘Snap’ Wexley.” She said, pointing at the chubby man in a suit. “That’s Jessika Pava, who seemed to be a good friend of mom’s.” She said, looking at Poe for confirmation.

“Yeah, they were in the robotics club together. Nerds.” Was the only thing Poe managed to say.

“That’s you, clearly.” She continued. “Mom, looking good. And this…” She pointed at the tall broody figure in the corner of the picture. He didn’t remember Ben hadn’t been looking at the camera at that picture, but at Rey, like she was the only thing that mattered. He actually had forgotten the way Ben and Rey used to look at each other, like they were ridiculously in love with each other and only had eyes for the other one. How they couldn’t keep their hands from each other, always touching, holding hands, a hand on the waist, a brush on the shoulder. It was disgustinly sappy. “That’s Ben Solo.”

“Yeah…” Poe cleared his throat. “That’s Ben.” She kept staring at him expectantly, blinking her big eyes at him, waiting for him to say something else. “What do you want me to say?!”

“Is he my father? Ben Solo?”

“Look Hannah.” Poe said, rubbing his face with the palm of both of his hands. “I think this is a conversation you need to have with your mother.”

“But she won’t talk about it!” Hannah ruffed angrily. “She made very clear this is a _no-no_ subject! I can’t just go and tell her ‘hey mom, I went through your stuff behind your back looking for my father and look what I found!’. She’d kill me! I need you to tell me, uncle Poe, please.” She said, pouting at him. “I need to know!”

“Hannah, what are you even planning to do with this information?!”

“Nothing, I promise!” She said, placing her hand over her heart. “The most I’ll do is some online stalking.”

“You’re not going to find him like that.” Poe sid, and regretted immediately after the words left him mouth.

“So I’m right?” she asked, clenching the picture. “That’s my father?”

“I will deny to death if you tell your mother I said anything at all about this subject, or that I even knew what you were up to, are we clear?” Poe whispered in warning, and Hannah nodded emphatically. “Yeah, Ben’s your father. You look almost exactly like him, since you were little you have. It’s terrifying how much, actually.”

After at least 10 years of trying to find out the truth, Hannah didn’t know what to do with the information she possessed now. She gazed at the picture in her hands, staring at the man she didn’t know at all but was at least part of her. She wanted to know him… She wanted to…

“Why did you say I wouldn’t find him like that?” She asked, crooking her head to the side, curious.

“I heard he changed names after college.” Poe shurgged.

“To what?”

“To what what?” He asked, making her roll her eyes at him.

“To what name, uncle Poe.” She explained. “You said he changed his name. Do you know his new name?”

“Sorry kid.” He shrugged again. “I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to him in, like, 12 years or something.” He said, making Hannah sigh.

Poe did, in fact, know what name Ben was using, but he also knew Hannah, and he didn’t trust in what he she was going to if he handed the information to her. Obviously, he knew there was ways for her to find out, but he’d rather not have one more burden on his back, when Rey eventually came to kill him.   

“Can you tell me _something_ about him?” She pleaded, blinking her big eyes at him. “Anything? I mean, just… something?”

“Well…” Poe sighed. He didn’t want to tell her anything about Ben after Rey left. The girl just found out about him. He couldn’t destroy him by telling her about his descent into chaos. Also he couldn’t really think about Ben without guilt overtaking him. A strange feeling that he could have done something else. But Hannah was so excited to hear anything… “You really is a lot like him.” He mumbled. “Not only physically. He was also very angry and very broody, but a great friend when you know him.” He scratched his hair, watching her smile. “He was my best friend when we were kids. My mother and his mother were friends. So we kind of grew up together. I introduced his and your mother, when we were in high school. She didn’t really like him much at first, but after a while things kinda clicked...”

“So they were dating in High School?” Hannah asked, looking down at the picture in her hand, at the way Ben Solo was looking at her mother.

“Yeah, for like, three years.” Poe nodded. “Damn right disgusting, they were.” He huffed. “The things I had to endure with these two around...”

“Why did he leave us?” She blurred out, her eyes looking at anything but at him, biting her lower lip after the words left her mouth, like she might have regretted saying them. Poe took a deep breath, considering how to say it, and even if he should say anything at all. This was _none of his business_. Rey didn’t want Hannah knowing these things. He wasn’t her father, he wasn’t her mother or any other close relative at that. He was just cool, fun uncle Poe. Rey was going to kill him when she found out he said anything.

“He… Hummm…” He rubbed his neck nervously. “He didn’t…?” Her head snapped towards him.

“What do you mean didn’t?”

“Your mother never told him she was pregnant.” Poe admitted, and now he was the one who couldn’t look her in the eyes. Which was kind of ridiculous, since he _didn’t have anything to do_ with this mess Rey had gotten herself into. He deserved a fucking medal of friend of the year, that’s what.

“She… what?” Hannah blinked, as if she misheard him or like he said something too crazy. “She didn’t…?” Poe shook his head. “You’re telling me he… he doesn’t know I _exist_?”

“No kid, sorry.” Hannah looked like she might be about to cry, or maybe smash her untouched cupcake with her fist.

“Why would she do this?” She asked, blinking unshed tears away from her lashes. “I mean…”

“You’ll have to ask her that, I can’t say.” Hannah looked angry, rubbing her eyes with the back of her free hand. Poe rested his hand on her shoulder. “I don’t know your mother’s full motivations. Only she can explain that to you.”

“Uncle Poe…” She mumbled, and Poe noticed the gleaming tracks in her cheeks. “It’s not fair! I just...”

“I know pixie, I know.” He mumbled, allowing her to lay her head on his lap, running his fingers through her hair. It reminded him, stupidly, of the many times Han and Leia would fight and his mother would take Ben home with her and make them warm food and let them sleep late playing games, and at night Poe would sit with Ben on the makeshift bed on the floor, holding his hand, while his friend cried in the darkness of Poe’s room. “It really isn’t.”

“Can you tell me more about them? My parents? When they were in school?” She asked, rubbing her eyes with a sad pout. With a glance to the side, he noticed BB had approached the cupcake that had fallen from the teenager’s hand, sniffing it and happily taking a bite in the sweet green frosting. Poe eyed the dog annoyed and the over weighed Corgi stared back, licking his lips, before going back for the tasty sweet. Poe shook his head at the dog. “Why not?” She asked.

“Oh, no, I was talking to beebs.” He mumbled. “What do you want to know?”

“Anything you have to tell me.”

“Yeah, lemme think…” He mumbled. “Okay, so, Ben he’s like very tall. Like ridiculously tall, six foot something giant, and I’ve always had that Ford X-Wing, yeah? So like, he’d never fully fit in my car. His legs had to be all bent and it was so funny.” Poe said, making Hannah laugh. “So this one time we were going out and had to fit everyone on the car and I was trying to push them together, and you’ve seen your mother’s legs…” They continued like that, Poe telling silly stories from his teens and Hannah clinging to every word, until the sun started disappearing from the sky.  

 

    

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, what do you think? I'm not really sure about the ending of this chapter, really.  
> All comments and kudos and opinions are welcome!  
> If I missed any mistakes, let me know.  
> Come talk to me on Tumblr, I love to chat - Stars-of-Kyber  
> Until next week loves  
> Cee


	6. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannah tries to be friendly and does some detective research on Ben.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m so so sorry about the delay. But alas, here it is. The next chapter.  
> I thought Hannah was needing a friend and I’m still in denial about Rogue One, so there is that. I’m trying to bribe my sister to make me a mood board rs.  
> Hope you enjoy this chapter written with lots of love.  
> Cee

“How was your first day of class?” Rey asked, wrapping the pasta in her fork before bringing it to her mouth, eyeing her daughter from across the table.

“Ugh.” Hannah mumbled, pushing food around in her plate. “Let’s just not.”

“Not?” Rey questioned, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah, just not.” Hannah agreed with a nod of her head.

“I take it it wasn’t so good?”

“You know…” Hannah mumbled, motioning with her hand to prove her point. “School and people and stuff.”

“Yeah, it sounds truly awful.” Rey said with a smirk and a tone that meant she was certainly teasing her daughter for her dramatic attitude.

“You think you’re funny.” Hannah said, rolling her eyes at her mother’s laughter.

“I’m sure I am.” Rey said, winking at her daugher.

“How was your first day of work?” Hannah asked, in a clear attempt to change the subject.

“It was… interesting.” Rey said, for the lack of a better word to use.  

“Not what you were expecting when you decided to leave home behind, hum?” Hannah said, wiggling her eyebrows.

“Not exactly.” Rey mumbled, looking down at the food in her plate. “I mean, the work is really amazing and the people there a great. Poe’s friend Rose works there, did you know? And I’m finally putting my graduation to some use. But.. I don’t know, Dr. Skywalker is just a bit… odd.”

“Odd?” Hannah said through a mouthful of food. “Odd how?”

“Manners, baby.” Rey scolded, making her daughter roll her eyes while swallowing her food. “Where did I go wrong?” Rey asked with a sigh when Hannah opened her mouth to prove she was not with her mouth full anymore and motioned her to continue talking. “I don’t know Hanni. He just seems angry at everyone all the time Like he didn’t want to be there leading his projet at all.”

“Was he a jerk to you?” Hannah asked. “I mean, uncle Poe and I could always round him up and teach him a little lesson.” She punched one open hand with the other fisted one to prove her point. “I may be lanky but I can throw a punch, if necessary.”

“That’s very sweet of you, baby, but I can handle it.” Rey answered, patting Hannah’s hand across the dining table with a smile. “If he tries something stupid, I’m very capable of kicking his arse on my own.”

“I know you can mom. But you can ask if you need support.” Hannah smiled back. “That pasta is amazing.”

“Yeah, I ordered from that little Italian place close to the square.”

“I knew it.” Hannah laughed.

“Now, you’re not getting away from that school subject so easily.” Rey said, serving some more food on her plate. “Tell me about it.”

“What’s there to tell?” Hannah mumbled with a shrug. “Classes are the same, people are just as stupid and annoying.” Hannah counted the list on her fingers. “Lit class was alright. The teacher is okay. But apart from that was just as the other school.”

“There wasn’t one decent person in class all day? Like not one?” Rey tried, leaning her elbow on the table and her chin in her hand. “Not one?”

“My chem lab partner was nice enough.” The annoyed teenager gave in. “And this guy in my physics class seemed okay.”

“Look at my baby, all grown up, making friends.” Rey sighed, blinking at her daughter, who threw a balled up napkin at her. “Where is my camera, I need to register that moment.”

“Ugh, I barely talked to them, okay? Me and that Lyra girl were kind of forced to mingle and the guy just lent me his pen, because mine stopped working.”

“You should thank this boy for lending you his pen.” Rey said, motioning at her daughter with the fork in her hand, a smirk on her lips. “You know, to have a reason to talk to him again.”

“I should probably give him his pen back.” Hannah mussed.

“You stole his pen?!” Rey exclaimed, shocked.

“I didn’t steal it!” The girl said with a frown. “Honestly woman, what do you think I am?!” She shook her head. “I just… forgot to give it back to him.”

“Which you will. Tomorrow.” Rey scolded.

“Yes mother, I’ll give him his pen back tomorrow.” Hannah rolled her eyes and nodded dutifully and teasingly.

“And then you’ll go and make some friends.” Rey continued, pointing the fork at the annoyed teen. “That’s an order, young lady.”

“You cannot force me to socialize mom.” Hannah complained “Just because you were this pretty social butterfly, surrounded by friends all the time, doesn’t necessarily means that I will be one too. That’s not how genetics work.”

“I’ll have you know that I wasn’t this social butterfly you think I was.” Rey mumbled with an accusing look.  

 “Mom, you had four close friends in high school, which is more than some people have in life.” She said absentmindedly.

“How did you know I had four close friends in high school?”  Rey’s stared at her with her eyebrows pulled together.

“Lucky guess, probably.” Hannah glupped, trying to sound undisturbed about it. She needed to be more careful about what she said. Her mother couldn’t know about what she knew. “Uncle Poe mentioned you guys had a bunch of friends and I ventured a guess in a number.”

“Hum… Right.” Rey said, eyeing her daughter from the corner of the eye, like she knew it wasn’t the whole truth. “You know I just worry about you, right? I want you to be happy.”

“I know mom.” Hannah sighed, half way annoyed. If her mother just wanted her happy, why had she kept her father a secret all this time? Hannah didn’t even let her mind start to wander that way, before she started snapping at Rey. “If it means so much to you, I’ll try and stand these people and talk to them, okay?”

“That’        s all I’m asking.” Rey answered, giving her daughter a warm smile.

“Okay, now, tell me more about this damn job of yours. We’ve had to move because of it, so now I want to hear all about it.”

Rey laughed and started telling her about her day.

 

Hannah slumped in her chair, ten minutes after the chemistry lab begun. School had started just a few days ago and she was already done.

She was having a really crappy day, and it was just 8 in the morning. Her mother and her had stayed up late watching some TV show and they ended up going to sleep after one in the morning. So, when it was time for her to get up, she was exhausted. Also, her alarm didn’t go off and she had to run to be able to get to class in time. Which she didn’t.

Great, just great.

Hannah slumped in the chair, resting her head in her arms as she listened to the teacher drole on about the particles this and that, closing her eyes to avoid the throbbing sensation behind her eyes.

She had been planning to use her free time between classes to dig around the internet a little, in hopes to search for information about her father, but, by the way her day was going so far, the computers in the library will have caught on fire, or something of that sort.

“Miss Johnson!” Mr. Frederick called, making her jump in her chair. “Is my class making you sleepy?”

She contemplated answering that, yes, his class was a fucking pain in the ass, and she was counting the minutes for her to stop being forced to look at the sorry excuse for a teacher standing right in front of her, but before she could open her mouth to say anything, someone spoke.

“Hannah’s having cramps, Mr. Frederick.” Every head in the class turned to look at the warm brown skinned girl with green eyes sitting next to Hannah in the lab counter. The teacher’s eyes widened at her words. “You know…” She mumbled, in a low voice, like she was letting him in on a secret. “She’s in that time of the month.”  

“Right…” He visibly glupped, tugging at his shirt. “Do you need to… hum… go to the infirmary, or…”

“Thanks, I’m okay.” Hannah said, resting her chin in her hand, giving her lab partner a side glance. “I took some ibuprofen before getting in class, just waiting for it to kick in.”

“Yeah… well…” He shifted in his feet, clearly uncomfortable. “Let me know if you need anything.”    

“Thank you Mr. Frederick.” She said and he just nodded back with his head before getting back to the particles. Hannah turned to stare at her lab partner, who just gave her a half smile and a shrug before turning back to the explanation before her.

“He gets very uncomfortable with the period subject.” The girl said in a low voice when Mr. Frederick released the class, five minutes before the bell rang.

“Right…”Hannah mumbled, shoving her notebook in the backpack. “I’m not meaning to be rude or anything, but… why did you help me?”

“You looked like you needed some help.” She shrugged.

“Hum… okay, I mean, thanks… Lyra, right?” She eyed the girl, who was leaning on the counter, looking at her with her grey-green eyes.

“Yeah, Lyra Andor.” She smiled. “Hannah Johnson, isn’t it?” Hannah nodded. “You’re not from here, are you?”

“No, I…” She sighed. “My mother got a new job so we had to move from Takodana.”

“That seems cool.” Hannah just nodded. “I have no idea where that is.” The girl said with a smirk.

“Yeah, almost no one does.” Hannah mumbled, toying with the straps of her backpack. She would have turned around and left the girl talking on her own a while ago, but she had promised her mother she would try to make friends. And the green eyed girl had been nice with her in class.

“Are you liking the new city so far?”

“It’s… okay, I guess.” Lyra seemed to wait for her to say anything else, but Hannah left the answer at that.

“Right.” Lyra mumbled, tugging her dark hair behind her ear, turning to take her backpack and leave. “Well, if there’s anything I can help you with…”

“Actually...”  Hannah brushed her hand through her hair uncomfortably. She wasn’t very used to being kind of friendly to people. It was just plain awkward. “Could you show me where I can find some computers? I need to make this search and the internet wasn’t installed yet at my house…”

“Yeah, sure.” Lyra said, with a small grin. “I’ll take you there, it’s on my way to crafts class.”

“Crafts class?” Hannah, asked, sending the brown skinned girl a questioning look as they exited the lab.

“Please don’t laugh.” She said, shaking her head. “I still can hear my grandmother laughing at me all the way from home.” She sighed, rubbing her eyes. “She said I would hate it and I didn’t listen to her, and now I’m paying for it, and she makes sure to ask about crafts class as soon as I step into the house.” The young girl growed. “She find it hilarious.”

“You live with your grandparents?”

“Oh… hum, yeah.” Lyra tugged on one of her dark locks of hair. “My father is an air force pilot and my mom’s on the military, so they are always away for work. So I live with gramps and grandma.”

“Oh, that’s… hum…” Hannah wasn’t sure how to reply that, so she said the first thing that came to her mind. “In my house is just me and mom.”

“Well…” Lyra shrugged, but there was a glimpse of a smile in the corner of her lips. “All families are different, I guess.”

“Pretty much.” Hannah shook her head.

“Well, library.” Lyra pointed. “There is a line of computers on the back that you can use.”

“Thank you.” Hannah mumbled. “I guess we’ll see each other later…?”

“Sure.” Lyra smiled. “If you don’t have anyone to sit with during lunch, you can sit with me… I mean, if you want to. It’s not a problem if you don’t.”

“Right…” Hannah mumbled, with a blush. Make friends. She promised her mother. And the girl was being nice to her. She could do it. She could be friendly...ish.  “It would be nice.”

“Cool.” Lyra answered, with a smile. “See you by lunchtime then.”

“See you.” Hannah mumbled, watching the girl leave. Friends... Yeah, she could do that.

The library was mostly empty when she went in, apart from the librarian, a couple of students who were actually reading and another couple of students that were enjoying the silent space to take a nap on their books. She couldn’t say she judged them very hard. She wished she had had this idea earlier in the day.

The computer, thanks to some higher force, had not caught on fire or anything similar to that, as she had feared, and seemed to be working. With slow internet connection, but working.

She could have, of course, used her phone for what she was planning to do, but careful was never enough when it came to her mother finding out about what she was doing. Who could tell whan Rey would do if she at least suspected Hannah was up to something.

Hannah had no idea where to start looking. She had so little information to begin with that anything she found might be of worth, so she decided to start with the most basic thing, and see where it would lead her.

She typed “Ben Solo” in the Google search bar and waited until the turtle paced computer would show her the results. She didn’t even expect to find much with that search since uncle Poe had mentioned Ben Solo had changed names sometime in college, but she was frustrated nonetheless when all she could find was a barely used Myspace account that related directly to him.

Next she tried writing only “Solo”, which proved kind of ridiculous because she ended up finding a bunch of definitions for the word solo and some nasty things that shouldn’t even show up in a school computer, but after scrolling by page four she found something remotely useful.

Hidden between several random mentions of the word solo was a compilation of articles of one of those People magazines named “The Princess and the Scoundrel” talking about the scandalous marriage of one Han Solo to Leia Organa, a fancy girl from a fancy politicians family. It seemed to have been revived from the bottom of archives for the last run for Senate from said Leia Organa. Hannah thought she might have seen the woman on TV one time or two, but Hannah wasn’t exactly keen on politics.          

“Leia Organa (20), daughter of the famous politicians and philanthropists Breah and Bail Organa, who have completed an year of their shocking death on Wednesday (See the article on page 24), just announced, through her press secretary, Miss Winter, her marriage to Han Solo (30), in a small private ceremony, on the 12th of this this month. The news come as an surprise to many of us, since the little princess of the senate only knew Mr. Solo for a short amount of time before they decided to tie the knot. We wonder why they would be in such a hurry…

Apart from the age difference and such short time, they come from two very different backgrounds. While she came from the royalty of politics, frequenting the Senate house and several high society meetings, he seemed to have the most obscure past. After a brief pass by the Armed Forces, from which he was dismissed by unruly behaviour and difficulty to follow orders, Mr Solo runs a well known dealer of parts for fancy, and not so fancy cars of unknown precedence.

As it’s well know, Mrs. Organa-Solo have been leading a strong campaign against Senador Palpatine and his assistant Mr. Vader, to expose all political schemes and scandals behind their time in the office and stated that her marriage will not slow down or put any stop or barriers on the ongoing processes in court. The couple will not answer any other questions about their marriage or personal lives and wishes that the reporters will respect their right to privacy.

We wish them a very happy and blissful marriage and a very long life together.”

Hannah blinked at the information, writing the names mentioned in the article on a small piece of paper, before scrolling down to the next piece of news from the compilation, which was dated close to an year after the last one.

“Senator Leia Organa-Solo (21) , who was one of the most voted and is now one of the youngest Senators in the house, and her husband, Han Solo (31) just welcomed the newest member of the family, a boy, on November 20th in Chandrila. Both mother and the baby are doing fine.

Senator Organa-Solo will be out of the Senate House for the next month for her maternity leave and Senator Mathma will take her place during that period.

The family is very happy with their new child and asks the press to respect their privacy in this joyous moment.

We wish happiness and health for the new member of the Organa-Solo house.”

All the next articles were about Han Solo and Leia Organa’s turbulent life together. He travelled a lot for work and she was busy in the Senate house, all of the articles seemed to agree on it as being the reason they announced yet another separation. It seemed to go on until current days, the newest one being from the year prior.

There was no other mention of their son in any of them. Hannah wanted to bang her head in frustration.

After a quick search on Leia Organa’s Google page, she was able to find an old picture of the woman, standing next to a boy of maybe ten or eleven, who resembled a lot the picture Hannah had of Ben Solo, but much younger and shorter, with his large ears prominent with his short hair. That was it. It was most possible that the boy was, indeed, Ben Solo, but it was frustrating the lack of information about him.

Checking the clock, Hannah realized she only had another 20 minutes left and decided for another approach before she had to wrap it up for the day.  She typed “D’Qar class of 2008” and waited.

It took some time for her to be able to pull open the page with the courses pictures from D’Qar university and for them to fully charge but it wasn’t hard to find the tall man in one of them. He stood up in the crowd. Quite literally.

   She managed to find the description of the picture just before the bell rang announcing she had to rush to her next class.

Scrambling in her small piece of paper, she shoved her stuff in her bag before leaving the library in a rapid pace.

D’Qar School of Law. It wasn’t much, but it was a start. And a start she could work with.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Opinions, critics, a hello are all welcome.  
> Next chapter might not come out next week but I will try, I promise.  
> Kudos and comments are like portions in Jaakku.  
> Find me on Tumblr: Stars-of-kyber  
> Lots of love  
> Cee


	7. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannah tries to plot a way to meet Kylo, with Lyra's help

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I LIVE! ~Instert mushu's gif~  
> I'm so sorry for the moth late update, but I had this very long writer's block and 3 tests in college.   
> There is my feeble atempt at angsty.   
> Thank you my two beutiful Brunas and Fernanda for the support and for the moodboard (bruna Chaves I love you).  
> I hope you enjoy.

“So, how is your mystery search going?” Lyra asked when Hannah dropped her bag against the lunch table with a clang. The pale girl let out a resigned sigh and dropped against the bench. “That bad, hum?” Hannah let out a grown that seemed to be in agreement, hitting her forehead in  the table with some force.

“I’m thinking of giving up.” The girl complained. 

“Oh, come on, there, there.” Lyra mumbled, patting her friend’s arm, making her lift her eyes at her, half annoyed. “It’s been almost two months since you’ve been on this crazy hunt. You must be at least close to whatever you’re looking for.” Hannah growed again. “You were so excited a couple of  weeks ago.” 

“I just feel like I’m not getting anywhere. And even if I am getting somewhere...” Hannah hit her head back on the top of the table. “It’s all just useless. And I don’t know what to do!” she cried, the sound muffed by her hands.  

“Well, can I help you with anything?” Lyra asked, biting into her sandwich. 

“I don’t know…” Hannah bit her lip, looking up at the girl sitting in front of her. In the past two months, she had become surprisingly close with Lyra. Hannah was not used to having many friends to hang out and chat and share things at all. In her previous schools, she didn’t feel very comfortable in approaching people, and no one seemed to be very interested in approaching the angry, always frowning girl either. Lyra, in the other hand, didn’t seem too afraid to talk to her when she was in a bad mood, nor to put her in her place when she clearly deserved it and she seemed to understand when Hannah simply didn’t want to talk, or when she really needed to talk and didn’t know how to express it. And force be damned if it wasn’t nice to have someone to talk to other then her mother and uncle Poe. 

Also, Lyra didn’t seem to be the most popular person in school. She noticed, after starting to spend lunch with the girl, that the only other person who seemed to be friends with Lyra was the boy named Thomas Antilles (from whom Hannah had stolen, borrowed, whatever, the pen, which he loved to remind her of). The two of them had been friends since the beginning of school and Thomas always used to swear he was the only person who could stand Lyra’s rebellious and stubborn head before Hannah arrived. And boy Lyra was stubborn. Hannah thought she met a peak with her mother and herself, but Lyra just set the bar a little higher. Thomas most of the time made her roll her eyes and shoot him looks with his stupid jokes and sass, but he was alright. He reminded her of uncle Poe sometimes. 

And Lyra wasn’t perfect either. She had problems at home and she had, slowly, started trusting Hannah with bits and pieces of it. Her parents, for exemple, always made her show up to class kind of pissed, with a dark look on her eyes and she had explained, in a angry whisper, that her and them didn’t always get along very well. It was nice to see that no one was as perfect as they made it look and it was nice to be trusted when someone needed an ear to talk to. 

Only Hannah didn’t know if she could trust Lyra that much yet. It was a big mess of a subject and she was dying to just talk to someone about it, but she couldn’t even dare to think about what would happen if her mother eventually found out. What if Lyra told Rey? What if she thought Hannah was being a complete lunatic and stopped talking to her? Or was Hannah just being a crazy paranoid person? Could she trust Lyra?

She decided to take a shot in the dark, and, with all those questioning rounding her head, she said:

“Well, I going to tell you, but you have to promise me you ain’t telling a peep to damn person in this whole wide world about it, okay?” 

“Cross my heart and hope to die.” She said with her head over her heart and a solemn face. “I mean, I don’t  really hope to die anytime soon, but you get my meaning.”

“I”m serious.” Hannah mumbled, staring at her friend dead in the eye. “No one can know about this. Not your grandparents, not Thomas, not even like, your cat.” 

“Awn, not even Munchkin?” She asked with a smirk. 

“Not even Munchkin.” Hannah said seriously. 

“What if I promise he won’t meow anyone?” Lyra asked, raising her eyebrow, with a mock serious face.

“No.” Hannah scrowled and her friend lifted her hands in surrender. 

“I  swear” she said, bringing her hand to her heart solemnly. “I won’t tell anyone.”

“Right…” She took a deep breath, looking around at the flood of people milling around the cafeteria. She might as well trusting Lyra but she wasn’t going to let all her paranoia go away so easy. “Can we go somewhere after class to talk about it in a little more private place?” 

“Okay, sure... we can go to my house.” Lyra mumbled, scratching her chin. “We have to work of the chemistry project anyway.”  Hannah groweld, hitting her head back on the table. “You totally forgot it, right?” 

“Yes.” She whimpered. 

“This thing is very important to you, hum?” 

“Very.” 

“Let’s survive this day and then we see if I can help you.” Lyra mumbled, pushing her chocolate pudding towards her miserable friend. 

“You’re the best.”

 

“Hola, gramps.” Cassina smiled when he heard Lyra entering the kitchen. 

“Hey, cariño. How was class?” 

“Meh, you know…” Lyra mumbled, taking a little of the mix her grandfather had in a bow and shoving into her mouth before he would notice. “Where’s Gramma?”

“In your aunt Hope’s.” He answered, without looking up. “Stop stealing food, it’s not ready yet.” 

“It’s tasty.” She nodded approvingly. 

“Of course it is.” 

“So...My friend Hannah is here, we have a chemistry project to finish.” Lyra said, motioning for Hannah to step out of her hiding place next to the kitchen door and into the well lit room. “Is that okay?” 

“Yeah,  of course.” Cassian mumbled, wiping his hand before turning to assess the teenagers in front of him. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Hannah.” 

“You too, sir.” Cassian had, during all his years in the Chandrila police, met many people, seen many faces and become quite good in identifying profiles and he was sure the young dark haired girl reminded him of  _ someone _ , though he couldn’t quite place her face with a name.

“I’m making tacos.” He called, as his granddaughter tugged her friend away by the wrist. “I’ll call you when it’s ready.”

“Thanks grandpa!” Lyra called back. “Love you, grampa!”

“Love you too.” He answered, turning back to what he was doing earlier. He was certain he knew a face very similar to the girl’s, one he hadn’t seen in a good while, but everytime a name came, it stayed at the tip of this tong, the face slowly fading in the border of his mind before he could form a clear picture. 

He shook his head, pushing the half formed face out of his head and getting his attention back to chopping the vegetables in front of him. 

 

“Okay, so we’re here in this very private place where no one’s gonna hear us, not even my cat, who’s Iocked outside, the poor thing,and you got me super curious about your secret mysterious mystery, so spill.” Lyra said, dropping herself in the bed and gesturing to the empty office chair she had cleared of dirty clothes for Hannah to take a seat. She sat down grimly, staring at her feet and wondering where to start about this whole mess. With a sigh, she mumbled:

“I found my father.” She lifted her eyes after a moment to check Lyra’s reaction, since her friend hadn’t said anything, to see the brown skinned girl staring at her confused. 

“You didn’t know where he was?” She asked, raising her eyebrow. “Like, did he leave when you were little or anything and disappeared?” 

“I actually never met him.” Hannah admitted, staring down at her hands, crossed in her lap. Saying it outloud gave her tingly feelings of dread and excitement at the same time.

“Oh, shit.” Lyra brushed her face with her hand. “And you like want to?” Her friend blushed, as if she had realized the harshness of her tone. “I mean, if you haven’t for 15 years…” 

“He doesn’t know I exist.” The silence that took over the room was palpable after that, and Hannah was not brave enough to look at Lyra’s expression just yet. 

“Oh, shit.” She heard her friend mumble and looked up to the young girl’s shocked face with a miserable pout. 

“Indeed.” 

“So, you found him?” 

“Yep.” 

“And what are you going to do about it? You’re gonna just get to him and ‘Hey you don’t know me, but I just might be the daughter you never knew you had’?” 

“I don’t know.” Hannah growled, pulling on her hair. This whole idea just let her so frustrated sometimes she just wanted to scream or smash something. Maybe both. Possibly both. “This is all so annoying. I mean…” she took a deep breath, trying to cool down a little to be able to talk as a coherent person. “I promised my uncle Poe I wouldn’t do anything about it. And if my mom ever finds out, sweet lord Jesus, be merciful. I don’t even want to imagine the shit I’m gonna get myself in if she finds out about this.” 

“Don’t use the Lord’s name in vain.” Lyra teased, earning a glare. “Sorry, just trying to lighten the mood a little.” She sat down, placing herself at the edge of the bed, and leaning her elbows against her knees. “So she doesn’t know you’re searching for him?”

“She doesn’t know I have the slightest clue about who he is.” Hannah sighed, kicking her leg up and down with nervous pent up energy. “She never told me anything about him expect that I happen to look a lot like him. And that’s because I pastered her a lot to get that itsy bitsy tiny piece of information out. She clearly didn’t want me to know who he is.” 

“Sweet lord Jesus, have mercy indeed.” Lyra let out in a surprised mumble.

“Hey, what was that about using the Lord’s name in vain?” Hannah tried to joke, but her voice sounder wrong even to her own ears. Fortunately, it cracked out a smile from her friend. 

“Hannah…” She mumbled, rubbing her neck, her smile being substituted by a frow. “Don’t you think that, maybe, if your mother doesn’t want you to know, she might have a reasonable… you know, reason, for that?” 

“I guess…” Hannah conceded. She had indeed thought this possibility over many many times in the time she was doing her search. It was a very true possibility,  but deep in her heart she wanted to believe it was not so. “I mean, Uncle Poe talked so well about him. And anyways, why would she leave everything behind and like, run away?”

“What you mean?”

“She left her entire life behind, like cut ties with everyone and just disappear. It was just her and me until she and uncle Poe met again.” 

“Maybe she was being chased by the mob, or something.” Lyra suggested, earning a glare and a raised eyebrow from her friend. 

“I just need to know, you know?” Hannah hubbed her face nervously. “I mean, it’s just not fair. I have the right to know. Why would she never tell me?” While she spoke, she allowed all the frustration and questioning she’s being through for the past month bleed through her voice. “She might have been depriving me from a person that might have actually  _ wanted _ to know me and I’d never know!” 

“Hey, come on now.” Lyra patted her friend’s back, as tears threatened to slip from her face.

“And I don’t want to be mad at my mother, but I am. So much.” Once the confession slipped from her mouth, the rest of it just came pouring down like a broken dam. “And I know it’s not fair, because she must have her reasons and she sacrificed so much for me all her life, but if she does have a reason, why haven’t she told me anything? Why leave me in the dark?” She sniffed, trying to contain the burning of the tears pooling in her eyes. “I mean, I’ve always been close to my mother, you know? It’s just us for so long. We’ve always could tell one another everything. We could trust each other! So, finding out she’s been keeping  _ this _ from me…” her voice cracked and she felt the tears start to run down her cheeks. “ _ How _ can I trust her knowing that?” Lyra took her hand and squeezed it, allowing her to finally break down, her body shaking with sobs. “And it’s bothering me and I can tell she’s noticing that it’s bothering me because I get mean and even more annoyed all the time for nothing. I don’t want to fight her, Lyra, but how can I trust her if she doesn’t at least trust me even a little bit?”

Lyra set by Hannah, holding her hand while she cried without saying a word, giving her the space and the support she needed. Hannah poured her heart out, ugly sobs escaping her lips and making her body tremble. Lyra sat there until she noticed that her friend was starting to calm down, and when her sobs diminished to small sniffs, she got up and left the room, coming back a few moments later with a glass of water.

“Drink that.” She mumbled, offering the glass to Hannah, who took it and downed it in one gulp.  Hannah’s heart felt lighter in her chest after the confessed her feelings, and cried her heart out, like she had just opened up a drain in a full bathtub. She felt thorn between light and empty. “Breath.”

“I’m okay…” Hannah said eventually. “I think I needed to… just let it all out, you know? I mean I was just holding all in for so long, I had no one to talk about it, it was driving me crazy.”

“It’s okay. It really is a lot to take in on your own.” Her friend said, sympathetically. “Everyone needs to vent sometimes.”

“Thanks…” Hannah mumbled. “For listening, I mean..” 

“Nothing, silly!” Lyra laughed, patting her friend’s shoulders. “That’s what friends are for.” Hannah smiled gratefully as the other girl dropped back in her bed. “Now, tell me what you found out about this father of yours.”

“Well…” Hannah picked the old prom picture from her bag and showing it to her friend. 

“This one of the corner?” Hannah nodded. “You  _ do _ look like him.”

“Yeah, well, his real name in Ben Solo, but he uses the name Kylo Ren for some reason.”

“Maybe he’s from the mob.” 

“What’s your thing with the mob?”

“I’ve been watching Boardwalk Empire.” She shrugged. “Carry on. Why did he change names?” 

“I have no idea.” Hannah mumbled, rubbing her face. “But I do know he is the son of Leia Organa and Han Solo.”

“Leia Organa, the awesome senator Leia Organa? That Leia Organa?” Lyra looked shocked. “She’s your grandmother?!” 

“I think so.” 

“Wholy damn, girl. When she like, knows she’s your grandmother, can you introduce me to her? Like I super admire her. My grandparents worked with her when she was after Palpatine.”

“Sure…” Hannah laughed at the amazed girl. “Anyways, he’s a lawyer and  works in a company called the First Order Lawyers.”

“And what are you going to do about it?” Lyra asked, laying down on her bed and putting her legs up in a pillow. “Do you really want to meet him?” 

“Yeah, but I can’t just come up to him and say ‘Hey, I’m your daughter.’” Hannah sighed resigned. “But I wanted to meet him, like, once, you know? At least to end my curiosity. Uncle Poe says I’m a lot like him… Maybe it would some stuff about me, you know?”

Lyra stared at the ceiling for a few moments, thoughtfully, before rising up in a jump, like she just had this crazy bout of illumination in her mind, and making it for the bed. 

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going to get some tacos from my grandfather and we’re going to come up with a plan for you to meet your father. Sounds good?”

“Yeah.” Hannah smiled softly. "Sounds good."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soooo, what do you think???  
> I'm not abbandoning it, I'll be posting the next chapter in a couple of weeks tops, I promisse.   
> you can reach me on tumblr   
> Stars_of_kyber  
> Thanks for reading.  
> Cee


	8. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannah finally meets Kylo and nothing goes as she was expecting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo ~roll the drums~ I finally managed to finish writing this chapter and Kylo's finally making his first apperance here since the prologue. Uhullll  
> I have to thank my Bruna, my dear beta, for spending hours live commenting my slow and torturous process of writing. This chapter would not be done without your help and support. Ily, parabatai <3  
> Thanks for everyone who left a Kudo or a comment in the past chapter, you helped me so much too.  
> Well, I'm going to let you read. Hope you enjoy.  
> Love, Cee

Hannah walked into the warm coffee shop with her heart thundering on her ears so loud she could barely hear whatever was going around her. As they approached faster and faster the ending of october, bats and spider webs were plastered on the walls and ghosts hung from the ceiling, decorating it all for spooky season and the earthy autumn smell assaulted her nose, but Hannah didn’t have the heart to pay any attention to it all right now.

Lyra and her had come up with a crazy idea that might even actually work for her to finally be able to meet her father without her having to drop the bomb of ‘hey I’m the daughter you don’t know you have’. It was insane, and likely to go wrong for so many reasons, but also, Hannah couldn't help but wonder, it could really work in her favor. 

Lyra has called his office, introducing herself as the responsible for New Republic High School’s newspaper and saying they were writing an article for career day about old students from the school that had thrived in their careers and they were wondering if he could spare some 20 minutes to speak to one of their students. They were half  expecting the secretary to tell her not to waste their time with something so stupid, but after he told them to hold for a few moments, he returned, asking if Monday would be a good day for them. The two girls stared at the phone for fifteen minutes after everything was settled, not really believing their stupid plan had actually worked. Then they started to plot what they actually do, since their plan ended after the phone call, not thinking much further than they no they were expecting to get. 

So on Monday, Hannah arrived on the coffee shop they agreed to meet on half an hour early, set down on a booth that was ridiculously small so she had so bent her legs to fit on (honestly, why people make booths so small? It was ridiculous), and waited.

  


Kylo Ren was angry as he made his way to the damn coffee shop, his feet stomping the ground comically, like a big child who was being forced to do something he didn’t want to.  Snoke was punishing him, sending him to meet a teenager and talk about his old high school. Snoke was angry at Kylo’s latest results and decided to punish him because of it, saying that Kylo should do it, if he wanted to become senior partner, that it was part of the job. Every damn thing Snoke had Kylo do was ‘but don’t you want the promotion?’ or ‘I could always change my mind and give it to Hux.’ or ‘maybe you’re don’t have what it takes for this position.’. He had been promising it to Kylo for years now. And every time there was an excuse for him not having it yet. A boring task to perform, a case he’d rather not work on to take, something he’d rather not do. 

So there he was, meeting to a fucking teenager to talk about his high school years, a thing he tried very hard to forget about. Just, great.

The place inside was warm and smelled of spices Kylo didn’t care much about, with Halloween decoration and a mix of business people with fancy suits and students wearing old sweaters and clothes that looked like pajamas, both types seeming like they’ve been running on coffee to survive for a while. Kylo was no stranger to the feeling.

Standing at the door he looked around for the girl he was told he was going to meet, the one with dark hair and a blue sweater and seemed to find her sitting with her back to the door in one of those idiotic smalls booths that not even a normal person could fit in, much less someone with legs like his. Or hers apparently, because the girl’s legs were half curled under her in a position that could not be comfortable, and he knew very well. 

“Are you the girl from New Republic High?” He asked coldly, making the girl stand up in a jump, her face pailing as she turned to face him. 

“God! Yes!” She mumbled shaking her head after a moment staring at him. “You must be Mr. Ren. I’m Hannah Thompson.” She offered him her hand, but he stared down at it and then at her face, and she recoiled, looking down at her feet nervously. “Please, have a sit?” 

The girl’s face was a familiar one, with the dark hair and big ears, but Kylo couldn’t look away from her eyes. The were nervous and darting from one site to another, but what called his attention was the color. It’s been years since he last saw hazel eyes like those, and that along with the freckles on her face made memories stashed in the deepest part of his brain slam back on full force and made Rey’s face pop back in his head. Not that she had ever left his mind, but he tended to just lock any thoughts of her in a box and bury it as deep as he could. But seeing a pair of hazel eyes just made everything rush back out of the box. It wasn’t that Rey was the only person with hazel eyes in the country, but he couldn’t help but think of Rey as he stared at the girl in front of him. 

“Hum.. Mr. Ren?” He realized with a shake of his head that she had said something that he ignored while he stared at the girl like a creep. Great, just great. “Can I…?” She motioned with the little notebook in her hand. He nodded with his head and she hurried to find the first question she seemed to have for him. “Alright. Can you tell me a little bit of why you chose to be a lawyer?”

“My grandfather was a lawyer.” He said impersonality. When she didn’t say anything else, clearly waiting for a compliment to his answer, he added. “Vader.” 

“Vader… Like Anakin Vader?” He asked, her mouth half open in surprise. 

“Yes.” He replied coolly. He couldn't fault the girl for her lack of knowledge about his history. His family past wasn’t a thing he was very open about very often and not for too many people. 

“I…” She stumbled on her own words and he half expected her to apologize about not knowing it, but she shook her head. “I thought Vader was a politician. I didn’t know he’d been a lawyer.” 

“He was.” Kylo nodded, half impatient. “That’s how he met Palpatine. You should check your facts before speaking.” 

“Of course.” She agreed, clearly trying to pull herself together. “So… Do you plan of following his footsteps into politics?”

“No.” It was all he offered. She stared at him for a few moments with those bright hazel eyes, before accepting that that was all she would get from him and begun to move on to the next question. He noticed, with a raise of his eyebrows, that she didn’t have a pen on her, and she didn’t seem to be taking any notes, which was strange for journalists, even wannabe ones. They always seemed to be glued on their tiny notebooks, always taking notes of this and that. 

“Well…” She cleared her throat uncomfortably. “Did your school years in New Republic High help you choose your career?”

“No.” 

“Right…” She cleared her throat again. “Do you think it might have helped you with your career at any moment?” 

“They had a good educational system.” 

“They do.” She agreed, waiting to see if he would say anything else, but it seemed to be all he had to say about the subject. “Hum… Do you…?” She flipped her notebook, trying to find another question, her eyes showing a soft glint of annoyance that seemed so familiar to Kylo that he couldn’t pull his eyes away for a moment. “Do you still have contact with the people you met in school?” 

The question came as an unexpected blow to his chest.

“No.” He said and his voice sounded almost angry. 

“I just meant...  I mean…” She was babbling now. “Some people say they make friends in High School for life and…”

“I didn’t.” His words are dry and annoyed and the girl seems to be almost sad.

“I’m sorry.” She half whispers, looking down at her notebook, her hands pressing the small thing until it almost looked like she was ready to rip it apart. “I didn’t mean to…” 

“And yet you did.” He answered and she looked thorn between ashamed and pissed. “Do you have any more questions?” 

“Yes, I…” Before she could flip the pages of her little guide, his phone rang in his pocket, making both of their attention shift to the noisy thing he picked up. It turned out ot be his assistant, Mitika, telling that Snoke wanted him back at the office ASAP, as usual. 

“Look girl, I have to go back to the office.” He said, while he avoided looking her in those tormenting eyes. “I have to go back to the office.” 

“I still had a few more questions…” Her voice sounded so down and disappointed that he did something he didn’t usually do. He took pity on her. He pulled his business card out of his pocket and handed it to her. 

“Send the rest of your questions to my email address.” 

Hannah took the card in her hands, holding it like it was something precious. Ben Solo, or Kylo Ren or whatever he was calling himself these days was nothing like she was expecting, but she still she wanted, no, she needed more information.

“I will.” She mumbled, holding her voice so it wouldn’t shake and show how nervous she was. “Thank you.” 

“Don’t spam my mailbox.” He said, seriously, as he got up from the booth. 

“I won’t.” She answered back, still holding the card in her hand. 

He lingered, staring at her again, like he did when he first arrived, like her face made him uncomfortable or upset. Like he could see through her lie and could read into her mind.

“Miss Thompson…” He said, like he was dwelling with the words inside his mind, like he was not sure he should say whatever he was going to say. “Are you really a journalist?” 

“I…” The words seemed to get caught in the back of the throat, and her mind seemed to be going blank. He was looking at her like he was trying to solve a puzzle in his own mind and she started to panic. “Do you know Rey Jones?”  

“What?” He seemed shocked by her question, like it wasn’t at all what he was expecting her to say. To be completely honest, it wasn’t what she was planning to say either, but the words escaped her lips before she could hold them back. He just stared at her like she had said something wild. “What’s going on? Is this some sort of prank or something?”

“No!” She felt frustrated, tugging at the tip of her scarf desperately. “I wouldn't… I’m sorry… I shouldn't have… this is a disaster.”   

“How do you know Rey Jones?” He asked, his voice coming out harsh. If someone was trying to mess with him, he would be really mad. 

“She…” Hannah tried desperately to think of something to say, but her mind came up blank so she just gave up with a heavy sigh. “She’s my mother.” 

Kylo Ren, a 6’ 3 terrifying man just stared at her like she had slapped him across the face, his mouth gaping open as he seemed to look for words. 

“Rey?” It was all he seemed to be able to say, as he stood, looming over her.  

“I just…” Hannah was shaking now and it was her turn to not be able to me his eyes. “Mom never talks about my father and I found this picture...” She pulled the prom picture she found in her mom’s yearbook and shoved it in his direction. He took it as she had taken the business card that she still held in her hand, carefully, like he might rip it apart with the slightest movement and stared at the picture like he was seeing something rare and wild, something that he was half scared of. 

“Where did you find this?” He asked, after a full minute of tense silence. 

“In the back of mom’s yearbook.” She mumbled, sheepishly. “i know I shouldn’t have, but I needed… I don’t know… Something, I guess.” 

He stood in front of her as if he was in a daze, staring down at the picture in his hands as if he couldn’t take his eyes off it while she tried not to look at him, afraid of his reaction. 

The daze was broken, after what it felt like hours later, but it was probably only a couple of minutes, with his phone ringing once again. He shook his head, like he was trying to push away his thoughts and grabbed for the phone, staring at the screen, then at her, like he wasn’t sure of what to do.

“I...” He mumbled. “I have to go.” And he turned around, dashing for the door, before Hannah could even get herself up from the horrible booth. She stood there, staring at the closed door, for what felt like ages before she forced her legs to move.   

She left the shop with a blurred daza of shame and anger burning deep in her chest, making her want to scream or something. Pulling the small notebook from her bag, she tossed it across the sidewalk angrily, but it didn’t seem to diminish the burning sensation inside her. 

In a blaze of furry, she curled her hand in a fist and smashed it as hard as she could in the brick wall closest to her. Hannah wasn’t particularly strong and, clearly not very good at throwing punches, because it made her knuckles bleed and shot an excruciating pain across her tumb. But, at least, it seemed to quell the hot red anger in her chest. 

For some reason, his business card continued fisted safely on her other hand, and she found herself unable to let go of it as she slowly made her way hom e.    
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well??? What do you think??? I would love to know your thoughts on this chapter. It got me stuck in several parts and it was just a great mess until I had it done.  
> You can all come talk to me on tumblr: stars-of-kyber   
> Thanks for reading, i'll try to post the next chapter as soon as I can.   
> More love, Cee


	9. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannah and Rey talk and Hannah gets a text.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I ever mention how much I hate chapter summarie? I do. A lot.  
> Now looook at meeee updating soo soon! I'm so proud of myself.  
> Actually all your lovely comments filled me with happiness and made me want to write more, so thank you all that are reading and commenting.  
> A special thanks for Bruna and Fernanda for putting up with me. I know it's not easy. I love you both <3  
> Hope you enjoy.  
> Cee

**To:** [Kylo.Ren@FirstOrder.com](mailto:Kylo.Ren@FirstOrder.com)

 **From** : [ Hannahbanana03@gmail.com ](mailto:Hannahbanana03@gmail.com)

 

Mr. Ren,

It’s Hannah Thompson. I’m sending this to apologize for the way I acted on Wednesday. I shouldn’t have blurted everything out like an idiot. I wasn’t really thinking straight and you shouldn’t have to deal with my mess.

I know what I said is a lot to take on and I don’t blame you for leaving. However, if you do want to talk or anything, I’m adding my phone number in here. You can text, or call, or email. Whatever you think it’s best. If you want to, of course. I’ll completely understand if you don’t. I won’t flood your mailbox.

Bye,

Hannah

PS: that’s my number 202-555-0158

 

Hannah spent two days trying to write a decent email, writing things and erasing them trying not to show how ridiculously nervous or ashamed and even after she mustered all her courage and pressed send, she had not been satisfied with it.

That was a week ago. And no answer had come. She had checked her phone every five minutes for days and yet, nothing. Not even an acknowledge that he had received the email and she was not going to press him. If he didn’t want anything to do with her, she would respect his wishes.

Still it hurt as fuck.

“How’s your hand, baby?” Rey asked, as she deposited the grocery bags on top of the dining table and sitting next to Hannah in the couch.

“Meh.” She replied, lifting her casted hand and staring dispassionately at it. She had told Rey a partial truth when she arrived home with bloody knuckles and a fucked up thumb. She’d told her freaking out mother, while she drove them to the emergency room, that she had punched a wall because she had gotten angry (which was true) because some boys had made fun of her (which was not true). Her mother had sighed deeply and said that she shouldn’t do that, but that she was proud that Hannah hadn’t punched the boys’s faces. “Hurts. And itches. It’s hateful.”

  “Well if you hadn’t ripped off the immobilization wraps, it wouldn’t be nearly as uncomfortable.” Rey said, kissing her daughter’s head and allowing the girl to lean over her. After two days with her hand wrapped so she wouldn’t move her fractured bones, Hannah had grown annoyed of the uncomfortable things and Rey had arrived at home to find that she had cut the wraps with a scissor and it lead to another trip to the ER, for her hand to be casted.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Hannah had shrugged, turning her attention back to the cooking competition on TV.

“Hanni, I was thinking.” Rey said carefully, after they set in companionable silence for a few minutes.

“Nothing good comes from this kind of conversation.” Hannah replied and her mother shot her an appeasing smile.

“I was thinking we could take up something together.” Rey said, running her finger through her daughter’s mane of black hair as she hummed. “How do you feel about Kickboxing?”

“Sorry, can you run that by me one more time? I” She asked, sitting up and staring at her mother. “Kickboxing?”

“Yeah, a friend from work is taking it and she said it’s great.”

“Sorry mom.” Hannah laughed, shaking her casted hand in the air. “I have a fractured hand, I don’t think I can pick up Kickboxing right now. Maybe we should try three hands pottery.” Rey snorts at that. “It seems like a mother and daughter thing. Maybe our attic ghost would like to join as well.”

“Well, I’m not saying to start right now…”

“Mom, come on, what’s this about?”

“Rose, my friend from work, the one kickboxing says it’s very good for, you know, anger management.” The subject wasn’t exactly a touchy one, since Hannah’s outbursts of anger were something the two women were both aware of, but it was clearly not a comfortable one.       

“I don’t think kickboxing is the best thing for someone with ‘anger management issues.” Hannah replied dryly.

“At least you’ll learn to throw a punch, so you won’t smash your hand every time you’re mad at a wall.” Rey replied in a clear attempt to lighten the mood. And it works. At least to some degree. It at least got a snort out of Hannah. “And it doesn’t have to be kickboxing, it can be any other sport. Maybe one you don’t have to use your hands so much for now.”

“You like to tease my suffering.” The young girl muttered, faking hurt.

“You inflicted your suffering upon yourself. Now deal with it.” It was something Rey always tried her best to teach Hannah as the girl was growing up. Deal with the consequences of your action, whether they were good or bad. You did it, you deal with it. “But really now, Hanni.” Rey’s face turns into a serious frow that makes Hannah worried about the path the conversation is taking. “You know I’m proud of how you’ve been handling your anger better, but you still have a long way to go. You can’t do something stupid every time you’re angry. It’s not healthy, baby. I know how hard it is to...”

“Right, you, the ray of sunshine. What do you know about dealing with being angry.” Hannah spat on her mother, suddenly feeling the red hot feeling bubble inside her chest, ready to burst. Her always smiling, always happy mother saying that she understand the strange burts that filled her chest and blurred her vision.

“I’ve been angry a lot, Hannah. Don’t you dare doubt that.” Rey’s eyes are hard for a moment in a way that they few times were before she let out a resigned sigh. “But I wasn’t talking about myself.”

“No?” Hannah asked, cocking her head to the side, taken aback. It takes Rey a few moments to get the words out of her, like she was thinking three times before saying them.

“I wasn’t just talking about physical looks when I said you look like your father.” If Hannah was taken aback before, it’s not even close to what she’s feeling after hearing her mother’s words. A little part of her is panicking, afraid that Rey found out about her meeting with Kylo Ren, another part of her reasoned that her mother wouldn’t be so swift when breaching the subject if she had, and that maybe, she had decided to share a little more with her. Those two parts together made her treacherous heart slam with full force on her chest. “I have seen a fair amount of him punching holes in the walls or smashing plates to know.”  

“Really?” She asked, and her voice was small, like she was back to being an eight-year-old in a matter of second.

“Yeah.” Rey lets out a nervous laugh, working her bottom lips between her teeth. “He had this ridiculous thing where he would take the first thing he could reach and howl away as hard as he could.” Rey shook her head, like the memory was at the same time endearing and painful to remember.

“Did he ever…” Hannah bit her lip, a shudder going through her body at the mere thought. “Did he ever hurt you? You know, when he was angry? Is that why you’re not, you know… together?”

“No! No Hannah, never. It’s nothing like that.” Her eyes become soft as she took her daughter’s hand. “He’d never lay a hand on me like that. But it wasn’t easy for him, dealing with everything. I’ve seen him go through a lot because of it. I know it can be painful. And lonely. Dealing with everything on your own.” She could tell her mother was in the verge of crying and it half broke Hannah’s heart. As mad as she was with her mother for keeping everything a secret from her, she still hated to see her sad. “I want you to know I’m here for you.” She whispered softly, touching her forehead to her daughter’s. “I want to help. And I want to see you okay. You’re my baby. I don’t like to see you suffer.”

Hannah closed her eyes, inhaling and feeling the comfortable smell of lavender perfume and grease her mother never seemed to be able to get rid of completely, feeling a different burning at the back of her eyelids. She took a deep breath and allowed her mother’s soft presence, always close, always caring, to calm her.

“Any sport, you say?” She asked, after a few minutes of comfortable silence.

“Any sport.” Rey nodded, placing a soft kiss in her daughter’s forehead, as the young girl tried to ignore the gleam on her mother’s cheek, which seemed to make the burning in the back of her eyes come back.

“I’ll think about it.”

“That’s all I ask.” Rey smiled, cleaning the tears away from her cheeks, as she rose from the sofa. “Now, I was thinking we could go to the movies. They’re marathoning those old horror movies in preparation for Halloween. They’ve got The Shining and Night of The Living Dead tonight.”

“Meh, why not?” Hannah shrugged, rubbing her wet eyes with the back of her good hand. “Better then Chopped, anyway.”      

    

Two weeks had gone by since Hannah had sent the email to Kylo Ren, and honestly, her hopes for any type of reply were mostly gone while she tried to finish her stupidly difficult physics homework on her own. She had snapped at her mother and told her she didn’t need any help with it, that she could deal with it, and now she was this close to swallow her pride and crawl to her mother’s lap, begging for help. She hated physics.

Her phone pinged, distracting her from her misery and she picked it up, expecting another text from Lyra, who was going through a crisis at home, with the impending arrival of her parents on the following week and had been complaining about it to Hannah all afternoon, but she was surprised to see a text from an unknown number.

 

**Unknown**

Good evening, Hannah.

 

**Unknown**

It’s Kylo.

Hannah forgot how to breathe for a moment and just stared at her phone in disbelief. Had he really answered her? She watched, wide eyed, as the three dotted bubble showed up in the corner of her screen and then was replaced by a another message.

 

**Unknown**

I’m sorry it took me this long to reply.

 

Before she could lose her nerve, she picked up the phone and started typing with shaking hands. She couldn't decide if she should call him Kylo or Mr. Ren or what the hell should she call him. He had called her Hannah, but he had given no indication that they were close enough that she could call him by his first name. Or that he would like her to call him by his last name. What if she did something wrong and offended him? What if she said something that made him stop answering. She couldn’t risk that, just now when she had gotten word back from him.

 

**You**

Hey

 

**You**

It’s alright

  


**Unknown**

I am sorry about the way our conversation ended.

 

Her hands were shaking so bad that she nearly dropped the phone to the floor as she scrambled to type an answer, and trying to stabilize the device using her bad hand didn’t help at all.

**You**

I shouldn't have dropped all of that on you tbh. I’m really sorry about that

 

**Unknown**

Do you think we could meet? And properly talk? I think it would be better to talk face to face than texting.

 

**Unknown**

If it’s ok with you.

 

**You**

Yeah! That’d be ice.

 

**You**

Nice***

 

**You**

We could meet on that coffee shop?

 

**Unknown**

They have horrible booths.

 

**You**

True

 

**You**

There’s a nice diner two blocks from my school. They have great milkshake

 

**Unknown**

Just send me the address.

 

**Unknown**

Is Thursday a good day for you?

 

**You**

Yea

 

**Unknown**

Ok. We’ll meet there.

**You**

Okay

 

And that had been it. There were no more texts after that. The subject ended just like that. With just a date and a place so they could sit and talk.

Hannah was freaking out.

Could she wait two whole days without freaking out and tipping her mother about what she would do? Did he really want to talk to her? Meet her? Was she dreaming? Was someone playing a prank on her? She could barely breathe, much less think straight.

Clutching her phone to her chest, she dropped face first into her bed, her physics homework completely forgotten and, and let out a  happy shriek against her pillow.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please tell me what you think.  
> Next chapter we're ggoing to have some of Hannah and Kylo's perspective.  
> I promise to try and update it as soon as possible.  
> Also I feel like it might need more tags, so if you have any ideas, let me know.  
> You can find me in tumblr: Stars-Of-Kyber (One day I'll learn to put the link on this)  
> Lots of love  
> Cee


	10. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I! AM! BACK! YOU THOUGHT YOU'D NEVER SEE ME AGAIN? WELL HERE I AM, AFTER THREE MONTHS I AM SO SORRY FOR TAKING SO LONG, PLEASE FORGIVE ME.  
> I had my last finals in college and then I graduated and then I went through some tough shit at home and some writer's block. It sucked. I promisse not to take so long next chapter.  
> I gave up at sumaries. They annoy me. I can't sumarize shit.   
> Thanks to Bruna, because woman I have no idea how you still stand me and my "read my shit".   
> I hope you enjoy this chapter that I wrote with much love.  
> Love  
> Cee

The two days that lead to Thursday were probably the worst days of Hannah’s fifteen years of life. All the repressed and nervous energy was driving her insane and she simply couldn't sit still. During the two days, she had started pacing around and babbling about anything as she tried, in vain, to just calm the fuck down. Obviously, it wasn’t working. Even her mother had asked if something was wrong, and Hannah had dismissed it as nerves because of tests. 

So, when the last class of the day was dismissed and the students started to flood the hallways, Hannah could barely contain her shaking hands. Or her bursting excitement. Or her maddening nerves. Half of her wanted time to go by faster, so the moment to go to the dinner would come, yet the other half of her was terrified and was begging her to run back to her mama and hide behind her legs. She wasn’t even close to ready to deal with how many things could go wrong. She was actively avoiding thinking about any of it. 

Hannah was so distracted with imagining and plotting what might happen very soon that she jumped when Lyra showed up next to her. 

“Holy Force! Are you trying to scare the death out of me?”

“I was standing here for almost about a minute.” Her friend defended herself, earning a glare. “Alright, alright, sorry!” They fell into step with one another, while Hannah clunched the strap of her bag idly. “You think I could sleep in your place today?” 

“Is everything okay?” 

“My parents are arriving tonight.” The young girl sighed, resigned. 

“Oh shit. I super forgot they were coming. Right, yeah, sure. Come over. I’m sure mom won’t mind.” Hannah worked her bottom lip between her teeth.”I mean, it’s Thursday but we can find…”

“Damn, it’s Thursday! That’s why you’re so off!” Lyra looked like she wanted to slap herself on the face. “I’m sorry, I was so pissed about my parents I forgot.” 

“I forgot about your parents coming as well.” Hannah pointed out as they exited the school building. “You could wait in the dinner while I meet him and…”

“There’s a bookshop just down the street. I could...” Lyra suddenly stopped, holding Hannah by the arm, making the students coming behind them nearly bump into them, letting out curses. “Oh shit.” Hannah followed Lyra’s eyes to a woman standing close to the school exit, wearing spotless clothes and a carefully put together bun. Lyra started tugging Hannah in front of her, using her friend’s advantageous height to cover her. “Hide me.” 

But the woman had already taken notice on them and was making her way towards where they were standing with a soft smile on her lips and stopped right in front of them.

“Hello, dear.” Lyra gave up on trying to hide behind her friend and stood proud, fixing the non-existing creasing on her clothes with a sour look in her eyes. 

“Hey mom.” 

“I came to pick you up.” Lyra’s mother said, seemingly undisturbed by the way her daughter seemed to be trying to hide from her. “So you wouldn't have to take the bus. And so we could spend more time together.” 

“Yeah, hum, sorry…” Lyra ran her fingers through her hair, clearly avoiding meeting her mother’s eye. “I have to go to Hannah’s house. We have this super important project we need to finish.” She looked at Hannah desperately, asking for backup. 

“Yes! It’s a history project about General Revan and it’s worth a huge part of our grade for the semester.”

“I’m sorry, Hannah, yes?” The young girl nodded, nervously. “I understand you have this project but it’s been a while since I haven’t seen my daughter and I believe today she should spend with me and her father. I’m sure you can reschedule your project for another day. Wouldn’t you want to spend some time with your mother after so long apart?”

“Stop harassing my friend, please.” Lyra mumbled, rolling her eyes, clearly annoyed.  

“I’m not harassing your friend, Lyra.” The woman replied, seemling calm. “I’m sure she understands that what I’m saying is that I just want to spend some time with you.” 

“Well if you really wanted to spend time with me, you wouldn't be halfway across the country 11 out of 12 months of the year, would you now?” Her friend allowed the bitterness to flow through her voice and it finally seemed to affect her mother,  who now seemed to be glaring holes at her daughter. Hannah poked her friend’s side, warning her to take it easy. 

“You know it’s not like that. I have my job…”

“That is  _ bullshit _ !” Lyra hissed, poison dripping from her words. “You know it, I know it, everybody…” Hannah pulled her friend by the arm, before she would do something she would really regret, like throw a punch.

“If you will excuse us for just a second.” She mumbled to the woman staring at them with a mixture of annoyance and amusement as she pushed the pissed girl out of earshot. “Girl you need to chill.” She said, trying to use her softer voice to calm the other girl down, and patting her back with her good hand in a manner she expected to be soothing. “You looked close to throwing the first punch in there.”

“I was this close, Hannah.  _ This close _ .” She exclaimed, using her fingers to demonstrate just how close she’d been to punching her own mother. “She’s… Ugh… I just wish…” The brown skinned girl pulled on her hair with a guttural grunt as if the words were choking on her throat. “I can’t!”  

“I’m gonna have to say that I think you should go with her.” 

“You think  _ what _ now?”

“Well, I mean, think about it.” She said, putting her hands out to calm her friend so she wouldn’t transfer her previous anger towards her. “If you spend time with them today, tomorrow you might be able to escape.” She reasoned. “Also you said your aunt and her kid would be having dinner there. Plenty of excuses to just avoid them tonight. We’ll come up with a new plan tomorrow.” 

“When did you become the reasonable one in this friendship?” Lyra sighed, resigned, after a few moments of thought. 

“I ought to, every now and then.” She shrugged. “Try not to make things harder on yourself.”

“Alright.” She squeezed her friend’s hand. “Thanks, Hannah.” 

“That’s what I’m here for.” Hannah shrugged with a smug smile.

“So I’m gonna go deal with my crappy parents.” Lyra said, placing her hand on her friend’s shoulder. “And you’re going to go talk to your father.” 

“Holy shit I have to go talk to my father!” Hannah’s eyes widened comically as she remembered where she was going. “Holy shit!”  

“Girl, go!” Hannah took out running, holding the strap of her bag so it wouldn't fall and make her waste more time, her heart slamming against her chest. 

 

Kylo Ren set on the bright colored diner, nervously tapping his fingers against the table top. He stood out like a sore thumb in the middle of the bright neon colors, pop music playing in the background and the mob of highschool teenagers sitting around. 

Hannah was late. Maybe she changed her mind. Maybe she decided that she didn’t want to meet him, after he left her sitting on that coffee shop. He didn’t blame her. He had panicked after she mentioned being Rey’s daughter and not knowing who her father was. If he was being fair, he didn’t exactly blame himself for the way he reacted either. Finding out the person you’ve looked for for years had a child and that that child might be  _ your  _ child… It was a lot to take in. 

After he received her email, he spent a lot of time considering the possibilities. It could be just a huge prank, but Kylo didn’t know anyone who would be stupid enough to play a prank like that on him, apart from maybe Hux, but Hux was too annoyed lately, and not his glowing self from when he managed to get on Kylo’s nerves. Also, Hux was only dimly aware of Kylo’s past relationship with Rey as Kylo rarely talked about her after she left. And there was no way Hux would have had access to the picture that now resided safely inside Kylo’s wallet because the only person who possessed this picture was Rey. She had kept the original one, promising to make copies for everybody before she left. So probably not a prank. Also Hannah looked like him, apart from the hazel eyes, the ones he had stared at like an idiot because they looked just like Rey’s. It makes him confused and kind of scared, but also absurdly curious about her. 

But of course, she had the right not to show up. 

Kylo sighed, looking at the time on his watch, then on his phone. He had taken the day off for the first time in what seemed years and arrived to the diner almost half an hour early. He’d wait just a little longer, he could do that. He was frowning at his work emails, cursing Hux and his stupidity, when she burst through the door, seeming like she just ran a marathon, and started looking for him. He wasn’t a very difficult person to find in most days, so in just a minute, she was dropping in a chair in front of him, pulling her backpack close to her chest. 

“I’m sorry I’m late.” Hannah said, in between puffs. “I was just… School and…” She pushed her dark hair away from her face vigorously and Kylo couldn’t stop himself but noticing how she actually looked like him. He had been so entranced by her how similar her eyes were to Rey’s that he missed the narrow face, pale skin and the other traits that he saw every time he looked at the mirror. “Well, yeah…”

“It’s okay.” He mumbled, his words thankfully not betraying how nervous he was. He wasn’t good at dealing with young people when he was young, and he hasn't improved much in the years.

“So…” Hannah mumbled, pushing her hair away from her nervously. “Hi.” 

“Hi.”  Kylo said, entwining his finger on his lap, just so he could distract his nervous hands. “What happened?” He asked, gesturing to the wrapped up right hand he had noticed after she had sat down and her cheeks turned four times redder.

“I…. hum… yeah…” She babbled, looking at her hand. “I kinda got angry and punched a wall then fractured my wrist.” 

She stared at him, clearly waiting for a snarky reply or some sort of judgemental look, but Kylo was the last person who could judge someone for throwing a punch at the wall.

“You should learn how to throw a punch.” It was all he said, with a slight raise of his eyebrow.

“Yeah, mom said the same.” Hannah shrugged, clearly surprised by his response. “She suggested I try kickboxing, you know, for the anger thing.” She seemed ashamed to be saying this and it reminded of himself of the feeling whenever he had smashed some piece of his mother’s china or something and he was sitting down, waiting be lectured by his disappointed parents. 

“Muay-thai is good too.” Hannah looked up at Kylo, assessing him with those damn hazel eyes, probably trying to figure out if he was messing with her or not. “But any physical exercise will do.”

“Yeah, mom said the same.”

“How...  How is she?” He asked, trying not to sound too curious or too concerned about the answer he would receive. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to know anything about Rey’s life. Although he wished she was happy with every fiber of his heart, he didn’t know if he was ready to hear about how she might have found someone who made her more happier  than he ever would be able to. Just the thought of her being with someone else made his heart clench painfully in his chest and he couldn’t stop the shiver that went through his body. “Rey?” 

“She’s good, I guess.” Hannah shrugged. “She’s an engineer and she got this cool new job, I think she’s liking it. And she started her master with the job, which she’s super excited about.”    

“She’s followed mechanical engineering?”

“Yeah.” Hannah said with a small glint of pride in her eyes she didn’t seem to realize it was there. “She graduated when I was 11. We actually moved here because this job would allow her to work and study in her field or something like that.”

“Where were you living?” He asked, sending a silent thanks to whoever force was listening that the conversation wasn’t going as terrible and awkward as he had expected. “Before?” 

“Takodana.” He raised an eyebrow at her. 

“That’s pretty far.” 

“You know where it is?” She seemed surprised that he even knew where that secluded place was. The wouldn’t have known, honestly, if his father hadn’t once been there for work or something and he heard her mother talking to him on the phone and mentioning the place. It was a time when he still saw his father as a grand hero in his life and wanted to know everything about him he could. So his 8-year-old self opened up a map and went after the small city. If not for that, he probably wouldn’t know either. 

“I looked it up once when I was young.” He shrugged, his voice sounding more indifferent about the subject than he felt. It was a strange feeling, knowing they had been in a place where his father easily could have been taken to because of work, if it was just a few years prior. “How long did you live there?” 

“I was born there.”

“And do you miss it?”

“Well, I guess. It was like nowhere, but it was my home you know.” She shrugged, a pang of something that reminded him a lot of longing gleaming in the back of her eyes. 

They studied each other’s face during the uncomfortable silence that followed. He had no idea what to say to her and she was biting her lips, gazing at his face as if she was seeing an angel or a ghost and was terrified of it. 

After a few moments of careful deliberation, he decided it was better to rip off the band-aid and just ask the question that was stuck in the back of his throat since he’d arrived, crossing his fingers that she wouldn’t be upset about it. 

“Why is your last name Thompson and not Jones?” 

“Actually, I have no clue.” If she was upset about him questioning it, she didn’t let it show. She actually sounded more puzzled herself then hurt. “I myself only found out she was ever named Jones a couple of months back when I found an old yearbook. When I was born she was already Rey Thompson.” She rubbed her face with her hand nervously. 

“Seriously?” He couldn’t contain the surprised tone in his voice. It was really not the answer he was expecting. 

“My mother doesn’t like to talk about her life before I was born much. At all, really.” She tugged at a lock of her hair, the tip of her ears going pink. “She acts mostly like anything before I was born didn’t actually happen and ‘all that matter comes after you came into my life’”. 

“Right…” It hurt a little, knowing this bit of information. More than he cared to admit outloud, ever, to anyone. So he didn’t let it show, or at least he tried not you. “Does she know you’re here?” He asked carefully. 

“God, no!” Hannah let out a dry laugh. “If she even suspected I was doing any of this…” She shivered, shaking her head. “God, yeah, better not.” 

“Why not?” 

“I guess she would be mad I’m doing all if this behind her back. And going after something she told me not to go after. I mean, she never told me explicitly I shouldn’t go after you, but she also never told me almost anything about you, so I guess it’s kind of implicit that she didn’t want me to know. Also I kind of lied to her and went snooping through her stuff and hid things from her. Which she hates a lot. She goes all ‘you broke my trust, how could you’. So I guess there is that too. And I lied to her about what I was doing today. I mean if we are really counting, I guess she might have a LOT to be pissed with be about and, I don’t know, maybe I deserve it and…” She grunted into her hands, hitting her forehead against the table. “I’m sorry, I’m rambling. I kind of say a bunch of stupid things when I’m stressed.” Her voice was a little muffed by her hands and the top of the table, where her forehead was still glued to. “I mean, sometimes I’m afraid sometimes going after all of this is worth it and…”

“Why are you? Going after this?” Kylo asked, and it make Hannah lift her head and stare at him, as she was trying to figure his question out. After he said it, he could notice that his question could sound a little harsh, maybe a little cruel due to the circumstances of the conversation, but it was too late to take it back. He would probably just upset her more if he tried to rectify his meaning anyway, so he just looked at her as she seemed to be thinking about his question and formulating an answer, working her teeth through her bottom lip. 

“I just…” She started, her voice quivering a little. “feel like I just need to know, I guess. I just feel like it’s a part of me that is missing and it might explain somethings I kept wondering about. It’s just been me and mom for so long and, don’t get me wrong, I love her and I’m super grateful for everything she’s done for me but like it’s just something I need to know. I don’t know anything about my family. Do I have a father, grandparents? An aunt, cousins? Anything? I found out my real family last name isn’t even Thompson, for crying out loud!” She sighed deeply, rubbing her eyes for what it felt like a whole minute before she continued speaking. “I feel like I’m a fake.It just feels like a hollow part of my story and I just thought finding something about it might make me feel less… empty, in a way.”

“Hum…”

“I don’t know if I’m making much sense but that’s how I feel.” She shrugged, defeatedly. 

“I understand what you’re saying.” He started carefully measuring his words, feeling her studying his face as she waited for the but that was undoubtedly coming. “But family can be very complicated.”

“I think complicated it’s better than inexistent.” His face clearly portrayed all the doubt he felt about her statement and it made her let out a small snort. “The way I see it,” she said, leaning her elbows in the tablet top. “it’s better to dislike your family knowing them then having no idea if you would dislike them or not.” 

“This just makes no sense at all.” Kylo said, crossing his arms in front of his chest with a frown.       

“Ah but it does.” She replied, making a wild motion with her hands as if willing him to see what she was saying in thin air. “You see, there is an approximate 50-50 percent chance that your family’s gonna suck, I’d say 25% chance that they would like really really suck. If you get to meet your family, you can decide for yourself if they are shitty and you want no business with them. When you don’t know them, you are kind of forced to have no business with them, so there is 50% chance that they are actually nice and you might be missing that. Am I making myself clear?” 

“I think I get your point.” Kylo nodded solemnly.  “I don’t particularly share your point of view but I get it.” He fiddled with his own fingers. “And Rey never talked about her parents with you?”

“That’s a no-no subject.” Hannah replied with a shrug. “Everytime I bring it up all I get is sad faces and averted answers so I end up dropping it. I guessed they died or something.”

“Or something.” He mumbled under his breath. 

“Can you tell me anything about it?” She asked, and he could see the eagerness in her, even if she was trying to hide it.

“I don’t think it’s my place to tell you this. You should ask Rey about it. It’s her story to tell.” She bit her lower lip nervously without looking at him, as if building the courage to ask his what was on the tip of her thong. 

“What about your parents?” She asked quickly, seemling before she would lose the nerve. “Han Solo and Senator Leia Organa, right?” Kylo raised an eyebrow to her. To someone who’s never been told anything, she did know a lot. Hannah blushed under his gaze. “I did some research.” She admitted, looking down. When she realized he was still with his eyebrows raised to her she relented. “Ok, I researched a lot. Like, for months. I wanted to be sure who I was looking for was the right person. Also you’re a very hard guy to find.”  That got the corner of his mouth to quirk up a fraction. 

“Yeah, I know.” An uncomfortable silence took over while she stared at his expectedly. “What?!”

“You were talking about your parents.” 

“No I wasn’t.” She kept staring at him expectantly. “Look kid…” Oh god he was sounding like his father now. “It’s… complicated. I haven’t spoken to them in a while.”            

“Why?” She crooked her head to the side.

“We didn’t agree on the way I was living my life.” He shrugged. “We had a big fight and there was that.” He took a deep breath. “Rey’s done the right thing leaving her past behind. Family business always end up getting problematic. Parents even more so. The best thing to do is leave the past behind.” Kylo’s phone beeped while he said it, and he pulled it out of his pocket to see a text message from Snoke, requesting him back at the office ASAP. Just what he needed in his first day of in probably two years. When he looked up, Hannah was nervously biting her lip, looking off to the balcony with a upset frown and it hit him suddenly that his words before might have been a bit… harsh. Also, she might have understood he was trying to say something to her, which he wasn’t. His parents were just a sore subject and he’s never been good with words anyway. “I’ve gotta go. Work...” He mumbled, showing her his flashing phone, and she nodded, without meeting his eyes.

“Yeah, okay.” 

“Would you like to… if you want…” As always, words got messed up in his mouth. “Meet again some other time?” 

Hannah looked up surprised, like those were the last words she expected to hear. “You wanna meet again?” When  he nodded, she opened a shy smile. “That’d be nice, I guess.”

“Let me know when it is better for you.” 

“Whenever. I have a pretty free schedule.”  She let out a small laugh.

“I have to check my work schedule.” He rubbed the back of his hand with his palm. “I’ll let you know when I get some time off.” 

“You have my number.” An awkward silence took place, but it wasn’t as bad as the first ones, and for Kylo, that was a good sign. His phone beeped again, breaking the silence and making them both move. 

“Do you need a ride somewhere?” He asked, as they walked to the door.

“I’m good. There is a bus leaving after the extracurriculars end. The stop is pretty close to my house.”

“You sure?” He asked, stopping by his car. 

“Yeah. You go do your important law stuff.” She shoved her hands into her pockets. “See you, I guess.” 

“See you.” He answered, and watched as she turned and ran towards the school with a silly smile on her face before getting in his car. 

Kylo sat in the driver seat for a few minutes, thinking about the past hour and how his whole life could potentially change. If he was being honest with himself, he hated change, and was completely terrified of what ways this situation could go. It was a running joke in his family that people with Skywalker blood never got along well with their fathers. His grandfather had never even met his father. His uncle said he forgave his grandfather, before he died, but their relationship was stained at best. His mother would prefer to pretend his grandfather didn’t even exist and mentioning his name was forbidden inside her house for many many years. And then there was his relationship with his father… 

So many things could go wrong. He could turn out to be a terrible father and fulfil the Skywalker family curse. Rey could freak out when she found out. Hannah could realize he was not the best person in the world and end up not wanting to be close to him anymore. 

Dread ate his insides as he turned on the car and started pulling out of the parking lot, but while he was terrified, Kylo couldn’t help to notice that, for the first time in a long time, he had a good feeling about this. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please please please tell me what you think about this wild chapter. I really really will love you forever for the feedback.   
> Next chapter we will be seeing our favorite old grumpy Jedi man and some more interaction between Hannah and Rey and Hannah and Kylo. Sorry, no Kylo and Rey yet. But soon....   
> Thank you for reading <3  
> Love  
> Cee


	11. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back y'alllllll!!!   
> The next chapter is basically ready, so I won't take long to post it. If you read and comment and Kudo, I can even post sooner (hehehe)!  
> Much love and may the force be with you  
> Cee

**November 8th**

**Hannah**

You wouldn’t happen to know physics, would you?

 

**Kylo Ren**

I am a lawyer.

 

**Hannah**

Yea, well

 

**Hannah**

You wouldn’t happen to know physics, would you?

 

**Kylo Ren**

No. My knowledge of physics is very limited. 

 

**Kylo Ren**

The last time I studied physics was 15 years ago.

 

**Hannah**

Damn

 

**Kylo Ren**

Why do you ask?

 

**Hannah**

I need help with my homework

 

**Kylo Ren**

Isn’t your mother an engineer? Engineers know physics. She’s good with physics.

 

**Hannah**

Yea, well

 

**Hannah**

I told her I didn’t need her help with physics, so

 

**Kylo Ren**

Why did you tell her that?

 

**Hannah**

Bc I thought I didn’t need help

 

**Kylo Ren**

But…?

 

**Hannah**

Now I do need help but I can’t ask her that now, can I?

 

**Kylo Ren**

And that is because…

 

**Hannah**

Bc I told her I don’t need help

 

**Hannah**

I’m too proud. I can’t take it back now

 

**Kylo Ren**

So be proud and accept your bad grade in physics.

 

**Hannah**

Gee, thanks -.-’

 

**Kylo Ren**

I’m glad I could help.

  
  


**November 11th**

 

**Kylo Ren**

Do you like sports?

 

**Hannah**

No

 

**Hannah**

Wait are you talking about practicing or watchting?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Both.

 

**Kylo Ren**

Either.

 

**Hannah**

Ah, well in that case

 

**Hannah**

No

 

**Hannah**

You?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Not particularly. No.

 

**Kylo Ren**

It seems to be something fathers do with they children, so I was wondering.

 

**Hannah**

Awn, that’s sweet

 

**Hannah**

But we can find something else to do, right?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Sure

 

**Hannah**

We could go ice skating

 

**Hannah**

There is a ring by New Republic Square

  
  


**Kylo Ren**

You know technically ice skating is a sport, right?

 

**Hannah**

Yea, but it’s an exception bc ice skating is fun

  
  


**Kylo Ren**

If you say so.  

 

**Hannah**

Can we? Pleaaaase?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Ok. 

 

**Hannah**

Tomorrow at four?

 

**Kylo Ren**

I can’t, I have a board meeting. I have no idea what time it will end

 

**Hannah**

Sounds boring

 

**Kylo Ren**

It is. At the 13th?

 

**Hannah**

It depends

 

**Hannah**

Can you pick me up at school?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Yes.

 

**Hannah**

Then awesome :D

 

**November 18th**

 

**Hannah**

I’m on my way to detention :P

 

**Kylo Ren**

What did you do to be on detention?

 

**Hannah**

I punched a jock named Blake

 

**Kylo Ren**

And why did you punch Blake the Jock?

 

**Hannah**

He called my friend Lyra a bitch and said she should go back to her country

 

**Hannah**

Which is ridiculous bc Lyra is born and raised in Chandrila

 

**Hannah**

Her grandfather is the one who is Festian

 

**Hannah**

But it was rude and I don’t like rude jerks

 

**Hannah**

She was upset

 

**Hannah**

So I punched him

 

**Hannah**

Gave him a black eye and everything

 

**Hannah**

Mom said she’s proud 

 

**Kylo Ren**

I can’t say he didn’t deserve it.

 

**Hannah**

Also I joined the school’s book club

 

**Kylo Ren**

It seems you had a very productive day.

 

**Hannah**

Ha ha

 

**Hannah**

I wasn’t going to join book club

 

**Kylo Ren**

So why did you?

 

**Hannah**

My friends made me

 

**Hannah**

But it’s not that bad, I guess

 

**Kylo Ren**

What are you reading?

 

**Hannah**

The Old Man and the Sea

 

**Kylo Ren**

It’s a great book.

 

**Hannah**

It’s about a book a man chasing a fish

 

**Hannah**

Literally, he’s been chasing the fish for like 50 pages

 

**Kylo Ren**

It’s a metaphor. 

 

**Kylo Ren**

About enduring in the hardship of life and refusing defeat.

  
  


**Hannah**

Look at you, mister I know everything about literature

 

**Kylo Ren**

It is also full of parallels with the Bible and Jesus.

 

**Hannah**

ha! The joke’s on them

 

**Hannah**

Bc I never read the bible

 

**Kylo Ren**

Me neither, but there are very simple metaphors, you just have to look for them.

 

**Hannah**

You never read the bible?

 

**Kylo Ren**

No.

 

**Hannah**

Your parents aren’t religious?

 

**Kylo Ren**

My mother was, but she is Jewish, so no bible.

 

**Hannah**

Wait does that mean I’m like half jewish?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Yes…?

 

**Hannah**

That’s WILD!

 

**Kylo Ren**

If you say so.

 

**Hannah**

Gotta go

 

**Hannah**

I can’t have my phone out on detention

 

**Hannah**

Bye

 

**November 19th**

 

**Hannah**

I CANNOT believe this

 

**Kylo Ren**

What happened?

 

**Hannah**

Sharks ATE his damn fish

 

**Hannah**

Sorry did I wake you?

 

**Kylo Ren**

You didn’t.

 

**Hannah**

ah good

 

**Hannah**

How can you like this book? The dude chased a fish for like 5 days then sharks ate his fish and people don’t care for him. 

 

**Hannah**

It’s stupid

 

**Kylo Ren**

Well, life isn’t fair

 

**Hannah**

I threw the book at a wall

 

**Hannah**

Mom found my frustration very funny

 

**Hannah**

Stupid book

 

**November 22th**

 

**Hannah**

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

**Kylo Ren**

I don’t celebrate thanksgiving.

 

**Hannah**

Aren’t you a spoil sport

 

**Kylo Ren**

I don’t like the holiday.

 

**Hannah**

Why? There’s food and thanking. It’s great.

 

**Hannah**

More the food then the thanking, but still! FOod!

 

**Kylo Ren**

Has your mother gotten any better at cooking in the past 15 years? 

 

**Hannah**

Hahahah nop

 

**Hannah**

She’ll burn down the house trying to make anything more complicated than boiling pasta and ain’t embarrassed at it

 

**Hannah**

She proudly brought our Thanksgiving meal from a nice lady down the block

 

**Hannah**

How do you spend ypur holiday?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Your

 

**Kylo Ren**

I stay at home, order some food and enjoy some peace and quiet. 

 

**Hannah**

Thnks Spelling police -.-

 

**Hannah**

So boringgggg

 

**Hannah**

You would have so much more fun here, we’re awesome

 

**Kylo Ren**

I bet.

 

**Hannah**

Mom’s calling

 

**Hannah**

Gotta go

 

**Hannah**

Happy thanksgivin grumpy

 

**Kylo Ren**

Happy Thanksgiving.

 

**November 30** **th**

 

**Hannah**

You don’t text much, do you?

 

**Kylo Ren**

No. 

 

**Kylo Ren**

Why?

 

**Hannah**

I imagined by grammar and punctuation

 

**Kylo Ren**

What is wrong with my grammar and punctuation?

 

**Hannah**

Nothing! That’s the point it’s too correct for people who text

 

**Hannah**

You actually use punctuation!

 

**Hannah**

On other news

 

**Hannah**

Mom’s dragging me to her company party thing and I’m pissed

 

**Kylo Ren**

Good luck.

 

**Kylo Ren**

Company party things are horrible.

 

**Hannah**

Thanks now I’m so much more happy about going

 

**Kylo Ren**

You’re welcome.

 

**Hannah**

I was being sarcastic u know

 

**Kylo Ren**

Really? I didn’t notice it.

 

**Hannah**

Are you being sarcastic?

 

**Kylo Ren**

I guess we’ll never know, well we?

 

**Hannah**

You lil bitch

 

**Hannah**

Back to the actual subject before u turned into sarcastic mode

 

**Hannah**

Mom says her coworkers are cool but her boss is a jerk and she sometimes wants to punch him

 

**Hannah**

Do you ever want to punch ur boss?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Yes.

 

**Hannah**

Is your boss a jerk too?

 

**Kylo Ren**

Yes.

 

**Hannah**

Bosses hum

 

**Kylo Ren**

You have no idea.

  
  


Hannah had been sitting in a corner in her mother’s holiday decorated lab for about thirty minutes and was about to go out of her mind with boredom. 

She had been introduced to all her mom’s friends and then resigned herself to sit in a corner eating and waiting for her social butterfly of a mother while she spoke with a bunch of people, one right after the other. 

The lab around her is not like super fancy, but it’s not bad either. It doesn’t have top notch tech but it seems like great projects and research come from it, judging from the clipping wall decorated with articles that seemed to be about people who had worked or studied there. 

She had been sitting there, idly playing a random game on her phone when her mother approached with a smile.

“Having fun?” Hannah asked, putting her phone down. 

“As much as you can in these type of parties.” The older woman shrugged. “You?”

“The food’s nice.” 

“That’s always a plus.” Rey said with a laugh. “Come along, I want to introduce you to my boss.”

“The jerk one?” Hannah asked, following her mother with a resigned sigh. 

“Please don’t say that stuff out loud in a place where someone can overhear you and I might lose my job.” She asked in a whisper making Hannah felt guilty.

“Sorry mom.” She mumbled, looking at her fancy shoes as they crossed the lab. “But is he?” 

“Yes, Hanhan.” Rey whispered back, but her voice wasn’t serious enough to make Hannah worry about her mistakes. “Doctor Skywalker, hey!”

The doctor Skywalker in question was a old man just a little taller than her mother, with a scruffy beard and long grey hair. His clothes weren’t exactly fashion, and if Hannah passed by him on the streets she’d think he’s more of an homeless dude than an awarded engineer, but who was she to judge?

“Miss Thompson.” He said, assessing Rey from top to bottom, which didn’t seem to shake her mother at all, as she threw him a smile.

“This is my daughter, Hannah.” Doctor Skywalker looked at her like he didn’t even notice she was standing there at all, but as soon as his eyes landed on her, his face turned three shades paller and he looked like he was close to fainting right there. He wobbled back, finding support in the nearest desk. “Dr. Skywalker, are you okay?” 

“I…” It took him a moment to gather himself before any sound came out of his mouth. “I’m sorry, I have to… go. I can’t…” And with that cue, he strode towards the nearest exit in a hurry and slammed the door after him, making half of the room turn to stare and making Hannah want to crawl under one of the tables. 

“That was…” Hannah started, but couldn't find a word that would fit the situation that had just happened. She looked over to her mother, who was standing in the same position since the beginning of the conversation, looking like she had just been slapped on the face.

“Yeah...” Rey responded after a moment. 

“I have no idea of what just happened.” Hannah mumbled. “Do you?” 

“No.” Rey said, rubbing her eyes. “But Dr. Skywalker is not the most normal person in the world at all.”

“I could clearly see that.” The teenager nodded. “Does he always give out this homeless vibe or…” 

“He was quite well dressed today, for his standards, I would say.” After her mother’s reply, a contemplative silence took over while the two women starred at the direction where Dr. Skywalker had stormed off too. 

“So, we go back to the nice food or go home?” Hannah asked after a few minutes. “I’m kinda already done here, to be honest.” 

“Just some twenty more minutes and we’ll go, okay?” Rey said, patting  her daughter’s cheek before turning around to look for some of her friends, leaving Hannah still in a half sort of daze. 

 

**Hannah**

My mom’s boss is coocku crazy

 

**Kylo Ren**

That bad?

 

**Hannah**

He kind of… took one look at me and stormed off

 

**Kylo Ren**

My colleague sometimes brings his cat to work with him. 

 

**Hannah**

People are weird

 

**Kylo Ren**

That’s a truth universally acknowledged.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo what do you think? Good critics, bad critics, neutral critics are all welcome.   
> Next chapter we'll have a very important reunion! Whose will it beeee?????? ~Mistery background song~  
> Much love and may the force be with you always  
> Cee


	12. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey regrets all her life choices.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You look at me, posting this chapter so sooooon!!!   
> I want to thank so much everyone that left a kudo or a comment in the last chapter, I was so happy <3  
> I hope you enjoy all the drama.   
> Love and may the force be with you,  
> Cee

Rey was sure Hannah was keeping something from her. She had first discarded her daughter’s strange behaviour as adjusting to the change of moving to a bigger and newer city and a new school, but after a while of her odd texting and her afternoons spent at “school clubs”, her mother sensors started tingling. Hannah didn’t like school clubs, or people in general, to be quite honest.

The truth was, Rey _could_ tell when Hannah was lying. Whether it was because her daughter was just a bad liar or because Rey knew her way to much to be able to tell when she was actively trying to hide something. It didn’t matter. All it mattered was that Hannah was _lying_ to _her_. She didn’t raise her daughter to do that! Hell, Hannah knew she didn’t need to lie to her. She could trust her. She _knew_ that! 

The final straw was when she needed to speak to Hannah and her phone was dead, so she called the school, and the sweet lady from the principal's office said Hannah’s only club activity was the book club and they met on Wednesdays. Which meant she was lying to her about where she was all the other days when she told Rey she was in school doing _God_ _only knows what_. 

With her blood boiling, Rey had decided she needed to do something about it. She needed to know what was her daughter doing that needed to be hidden from her. Confronting Hannah about it would only make her recoil into herself and be more careful, so she needed another plan. And that was how she ended up sitting in her car, carefully parked a few feet away from the school entrance, hidden enough so Hannah wouldn't notice the familiar vehicle there when she left the school. 

There were a few other parents parked close to the school doors, SUVs mixing with sports cars and family minivans. Hannah would have a heart attack if Rey ever showed up to pick her up in a minivan. She’d accuse her of officially turning into soccer mom. Rey would laugh at the idea, if she weren’t so mad at the moment. 

It took 15 minutes after the bell rang for Rey to spot Hannah leaving the school, her mop of black hair falling into her face as she made her way out of the door, carrying her messenger bag in her left shoulder and blue scarf wrapped around her neck. She stopped in the bottom of the stairs, bidding goodbye to her friend whom Rey honestly couldn’t remember the name right now, and started walking towards the black SUV parked on the curb, a tall man leaning distractedly over the passenger side, looking at his phone. 

So that was it?! Hannah was dating an older man? Telling her she was in school, or with a friend, when she was in fact meeting this random guy? Spending  her day texting this man Rey didn’t even know existed?! Rey wanted to scream. Was she failing so bad as a mother that her daughter had to do things behind her back? And what was this guy thinking?! Hannah was 15 years old! He seemed to be much older then her. This wasn’t some teenager affair, it was worst then that.

Without even thinking about anything but the hot red anger boiling inside her heart and brain, Rey jumped out of the car and marched up to where Hannah was standing, smiling at the stranger, who reached to take her bag and put it in the back seat of the SUV before making his way to the driver’s seat. 

Hannah noticed her fuming mother making her way to her when she was opening the passenger door and her face ashened, as if she’d seen a ghost. She dropped the handle of the car and raised her palms towards Rey, in a motion to calm her, as if she was calming an angry beast. It only made Rey angrier.

“Mom.” She said, eyes wide. The man stopped dead on his track but Rey didn’t even glance his way, going straight for her daughter. “I  _ can _ explain.”           

“Explain  _ what _ Hannah?!” She asked, stopping two steps away from the teenager, who looked close to having a panic attack right in the spot. Rey took a step towards her and Hannah took a step back, jumping when her back hit the metal door. “Explain why you’ve been lying to me about what you were doing after class? Or explain why you’re entering the car of this  _ stanger _ …”

“Mom, please, it’s  _ not _ what you’re thinking!” Hannah said, desperately.

“It’s not?!” Rey was fuming, her voice dripping with anger. “So you’re not lying to me? Is this, what, trekking team?!” Hannah looked thorn between angry and about to cry. “Or you’re not getting in this man’s car?!”

“Mom, let…” 

“I don’t want to hear what you have to say now! I don’t even want to hear your voice right now. I’m so angry, you have _ no  _ idea. I didn’t raise you like  _ that _ . I don’t even want to look at you right now, less I do something crazy!” Rey half yelled. Fuck it if she was attracting the attention of the people around her. Let them stare. Hannah looked like she’d just been slapped, her mouth opening and closing like a gutted fish without a sound leaving it. Rey rubbed her face with a sigh, trying to calm down. “Just, please get your stuff and go wait in the car.”

“Mom...” She tried again, but Rey shook her head.

“We’ll talk about this at home.” Rey said harshly, staring at her daughter in the eye. “Now get your stuff and wait for me in the car.  _ Now _ .” 

She saw Hannah’s eyes wander to the man, who had moved closer, standing next to the back of the car, and saw, at the side of her view, the man softly motioning with his head, probably telling her to obey her angry mother. At least he had  _ some _ sense. Stomping her foot and huffing like a small child, the teenager yanked the back seat door open, pulling her bag and slamming the door behind her, in one of her usual anger attacks. Rey stared at her with her raised eyebrows as she left, before turning to look at the man, who had his face in his hands, rubbing his eyes with a tired sigh. 

“And you…” She started, pointing at him. “Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?!”

“This is not what you’re thinking, Rey.” He said on a low tone, between his fingers. She didn’t even  _ want _ to know how he knew her first name or who he thought he was to call her by it. 

“It’s not…?!” She choked on her words in disbelief. How dare he?! “GOD! She’s half your age, you know that?! She’s just a kid and you come tell me it’s…”

“Rey, stop.” He said, grabbing her forearms and forcing her to look at him. “You need to calm down.”

“You don’t have the right…” She trailed off, truly looking at the tall man’s face for the first time since the conversation had started. Her mouth hung open as she stared into a face she hadn’t seen in almost 16 years. A face so similar to the one she stared at every time she looked at her daughter. “ _ Ben _ …?” 

“This is  _ not _ what you’re thinking.” He repeated slowly, in a low voice. 

“ _ Let go of me _ .” She growled. He slowly redrew his hands from her forearms and before she could think about it or he could say anything else, she moved her arm, her hand meeting his left cheek with a loud slap, the pale flesh quickly turning into an angry red. It was a rather stupid move, seeing she was half his size, but she didn’t care. He looked shocked for a moment, before pressing his hand to the where she slapped him. 

“You haven’t changed a thing.” He mumbled with a bitter laugh. He had the balls to look kind of amused at her. 

_ You have _ , she wanted to say. He changed a lot since they last met. He seemed bigger, not the skinny lanky teen he’d been, more serious, if this was even possible. His hair was still the same though, a long mess of black curls and his eyes… She didn’t even want to think about his goddamn sad eyes. 

“Why was my daughter getting in your car?” She asked, instead. 

“We’re going to get some milkshake.” He said with an one sided shrug like it was the most ordinary thing ever. The way her treacherous heart was beating wildly in her chest only made her more angry.

“How did you even…” She mumbled, her head spinning. “Force…” She tugged on her hair. “Was it Poe?! I’m gonna  _ kill _ him.” 

“I haven’t seen Poe in over 12 years.” He said and his tone and his face were dead serious now. “Hannah came to talk to me on her own.”

“She  _ what _ ?!” Rey half yelled. “How did she even…? Ugh, I can’t believe it. And you… You don’t have the right to just go out for milkshakes with  _ my _ daughter!”   

“Your daughter?” His voice was low, but she could hear the meaning behind those words, the questioning. “That’s rich, Rey.” 

“Yes my daughter!” She pointed her finger at his face, her blood boiling hot in her veins. “Mine! You have no business with her!”

“Look me in the eye and tell me she’s not my daughter.” He dared. “Tell me that that girl sitting in the car who looks just like me is not my child.”

Rey stared at him for a moment before looking down at the floor. She could talk of Hannah as much as she wanted, but she was as bad of a liar as her child. “It doesn’t matter.” Rey says with a decisive glare. “I’ve made my decisions long ago and we’re fine. I don’t need anybody else in my daughter’s life.”

“And how does Hannah feel about that?” He asks, arms crossed in front of his chest and a serious look on his face that could probably freeze fire. The glare Rey sends his way is murderous. 

“I don’t want you” she said, pointing her finger at his chest angrily. “anywhere near my daughter.” Her voice was surprisingly firm for the anger she was feeling. She didn’t even care that people were staring at their discussion. “If I find out you’re talking to her, I will call the police.”

“You can try.” He said, as she turned around and stormed to her car where she could see Hannah waiting inside. “Let’s see how that turns out for you.”

As much as she wanted to go back and throw a punch or something, she kept walking and forced herself not to look back at him. More arguing about it wouldn’t get them anywhere.

Rey slammed the car door behind her shaking, unsure if it was from the cold or from the anger boiling the blood in her veins. 

“Why did you” Hannah started to say but Rey stopped her.

“I don’t even want to hear what you have to say right now.” The harshness in her voice made her daughter recoil into the passenger seat. With her hands still shaking, Rey pulled out of the parking spot and into the road. The silence in the car was palpable, the only sound being the soft hum of Rey’s car. None of them had even made a move to reach for the radio. 

“I thought I could trust you.” Rey said, after ten minutes of uncomfortable silence. Hannah didn’t lift her head from where it was leaning against the cold window or acknowledged her in any way. “For fifteen years I believed  _ stupidly _ that you would never go and do shit behind my back and in two months and being angry you managed to destroy it. All those fifteen years. You betrayed me.” Hannah still didn’t respond to her accusations, but Rey noticed a small flinch from her words. “What was that for Hannah? Is it revenge? Are you mad at me because we left Takodana? Was it boredom? Why would you...”

“You’re not being fair!” Hannah cried, slamming her fist against the dashboard. 

“Oh I’m not being fair here? Honestly?!” 

“You never considered how I might feel. It’s always what you think I want, you think I feel!”

“You never considered how I FEEL Hannah!” Rey hit the brakes so hard that they would have both crashed the windshield if they hadn’t been with their seatbelts on. Car horns and curses came from outside as other people drove past them and went by ignored. “I always let you do ANYTHING! I asked you not to stir one subject, leave ONE thing alone, but no! You CAN’T because all it matter is what YOU feel!” Rey exploded. She wasn’t one to yell much, but the anger, the feeling of betrayal and the shame building up inside were reaching its breaking point  and they needed to get out somehow. “It’s always how  _ you _ feel and what  _ you _ want to do. You don’t stop to think how it will affect other people!” Rey took a deep breath and turned the car back on. “And it’s my fault.” She complained while she couldn’t turn to look at her daughter, using the driving at an excuse not to have to. “It’s my fault because I wanted to give you  _ every damn thing _ I never had in life and I was compensating and I fucking let you do whatever you wanted!” 

The rest of the way home was made in an uncomfortable atmosphere. Rey was still mad, hurt and ashamed while Hannah, on her part, didn’t seem to want to push her luck with her irritated mother. As soon as the front door was closed behind them, the teenager tried to bolt to her room but her mother blocked the stairs access. 

“Give me your phone.” She said.

“Excuse me?” 

“I can’t trust you with it, so…” Rey extended her hand towards her gaping daughter.

“You can’t take my phone!” 

“Well I payed for it, so yes I can!”

“You’re being a bitch!” Hannah said, pulling her phone against her chest.

“Well, you are going behind my back and doing things I explicitly told you not to!” Rey said, the unternotes of anger coming back to her tone. 

“You took this from me! You hid this from me while all of this time I might have had a father, who  _ didn’t even know I existed _ !”

“I was trying to protect you!” The woman screamed. “And you don’t even know him! You could have…”

“I probably know him as much as I know you!” Hannah screamed back. “I don’t know you, Rey Jones, or whatever your fucking real name is! I don’t know where you are from, or who you really were before you had me!” Tears started to run down the teenager’s face and she felt like her heart might explode inside of her chest as she let out the bottled feelings out, feelings she’d been holding back since she found her mother’s yearbook. “You keep talking about breaking trust and how I betrayed you, but YOU DON’T TRUST ME! You don’t trust me to know who you are, or anything about you! How do you expect me to trust you?!” She saw her mother take a step back like she was hit in the face and even though a little part of her was glad she finally got to put it all out, another was hurting as much as the older woman was. “Guess what?! Trust goes both ways or whatever the line is.” 

“I was trying to protect you!” Rey cried back. 

“Too late now, isn’t it?.” Hannah stepped closer to her mother until they were eye to eye. To Rey’s merit, she didn’t step back. 

“I have dedicated my entire life so you would be happy, so you wouldn’t have to go through what I had to go through.”

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t have had.” Hannah said and it seemed like she had hit a nerve. The spark burning in her mother’s eyes seemed to go out in a blink and her face was taken by a strange empty feeling that Hannah couldn’t exactly pinpoint. 

Without another word, Rey turned around and went up the stairs. Hannah could hear her as she moved through the corridor and slammed the door behind her. After the house became silent, the young girl allowed herself to slump down to the floor and while she cried, she wondered if maybe this time both of them had taken a step too far. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wellllll, what do you think? Was it what you were expecting for their reunion? More drama af coming in the next chapter of course.   
> This chapter was partialy written since the begining of the story, I was so worried about the reaction to it.  
> Please leave a Kudo and/or a comment with your thoughts of this chapter, pretty pleaseeee.   
> You can find me on tumblr at: Stars-of-kyber.tumblr.com  
> Love and may the force be with you,  
> Cee

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed .  
> Well, if you catch any mistakes, go scream at Bruna. Lol joking, just let me know.  
> I already have a few chapters up and ready and I'm planning on updating every friday, if possible, so keep tuned.  
> Any mistakes regarding High School stuff, I'm sorry, I always get confused with those strange high school names.  
> Next chapter we get to meet our adorable Hannah.  
> Come find me on tumblr - Stars_of_Kyber  
> Lots of Love  
> Cee


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